Creative Science

Introduction

“God, after He spoke long ago to the fathers in the prophets in many portions and in many ways, in these last days has spoken to us in His Son, whom He appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the world. And He is the radiance of His glory and the exact representation of His nature, and upholds all things by the word of His power.”—Hebrews 1:1-3a (ESV)

What is the meaning of life? Do we have purpose? Is there more to our existence than the material reality we all experience? Where did we come from? These are questions people have grappled with for a very long time. Many answers are available—the question is which answer to accept. In the end, it comes down to what we choose to believe.

As for me, although I am not a scientific scholar or a theologian, I have spent years studying the debate between Creation and Evolution with great interest. It is my humble opinion that what we choose to believe about origins matters. That is why I am taking time to put my findings in writing. I have researched not only the scriptures, but a broad range of books by Charles Darwin (seminary drop-out and father of the modern Theory of Evolution) to Dr. Henry Morris (hydrologist and father of the modern Creation Science movement).

As a Christian I believe Jesus Christ is Lord. We are told throughout scripture to have faith in God the Father and in His son, Lord Jesus. We are never told to have blind faith. It is my contention that belief in biblical creation is entirely reasonable rather than blind. It is also my contention that Evolution is not reasonable and that faith in evolutionary theory associated philosophies requires blind faith. Beyond this, while there are many beliefs between the fully atheistic and materialistic Evolution and the supernatural special six-day Creation revealed in scripture, close examination of the evidence will require a thoughtful person to choose between extremes rather than stand on the shifting sands between the two.

1. Belief Systems

“In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.”—Genesis 1:1

“Wheresoever, therefore, all things together (that is all the parts of one whole) happened like as if they were made for the sake of something, these were preserved, having been appropriately constituted by an internal spontaneity and whatsoever things were not thus constituted, perished, and still perish.”—Charles Darwin (Origin of Species).

Belief systems fall into two basic categories—natural and supernatural. At the natural end of the belief spectrum is Materialism. Materialism is the atheistic belief that material (natural) reality is the only reality. Revelation lies at the opposite end of the belief spectrum. Revelationism is the belief that the scriptural account of creation is a direct and personal revelation from the Creator.

The most straightforward reading of the creation account in Genesis is that the entire universe and all kinds of life on earth were created in six ordinary days. According to scripture, the earth is roughly 6000 years old. Man was created in God’s image with purpose and free will. Man used free will to rebel God—this is called “sin”—and death resulted. All death and suffering today are the result of sin. Genesis goes on to explain that the world and all air-breathing creatures were destroyed in a planetary flood because of the wickedness of rebellious humanity. God spared Noah, his family, and at least one pair of every air-breathing animal on an ark built at God’s personal direction. All people and land animals alive today are descendants of those who survived on the ark. Those who believe Genesis to be true are Creationists. Some believe the account to be both true and literal. This belief is often called Young Earth Creation (YEC). Some believe the Genesis account to be true, but not literal. There are a number of beliefs in this category such as Day-Age theory, Progressive Creationism, Theistic Evolution, and others.

Materialism in its pure form is purely naturalistic and necessarily atheistic. If there is no supernatural reality there can be no God, god, gods, or any other spiritual mumbo-jumbo. Without a supernatural super-mind the universe must have organized itself and life must have arisen by purely natural means. Materialism is fatalistic because denies purpose and relegates origin to chance. If nature is all that there is, then the only source for understanding must be human thought. In other words, Materialism can by definition be no more than a human philosophical invention.

Technically, the phrase “Theory of Evolution” refers the diversification of life through the process of natural selection as initially described by Charles Darwin. Although Darwin was among the first to theorize natural selection is the mechanism of Evolution, the idea of evolution dates back at least as far as Aristotle and ancient Greece. Evolution seeks to explain the origin and diversity of life in purely naturalistic terms. Scientists prefer the term “abiogenesis” to describe the rise of life from non-life and “Evolution” to describe the development of diverse life from original life. Since the theory of biological Evolution (and abiogenesis) is based on natural processes, its foundation is Materialism. A number of other theories, notably Uniformitarianism and Big Bang, dovetail with Evolution to form a comprehensive natural (Materialist) explanation of origins.

Between the extremes lay any number of belief systems. In ancient times many people worshipped the sun, moon, wind, animals or other elements of nature. Many Eastern religions as well as various New Age cults deify nature in substantially similar ways. Keeping crystals because of belief that they provide healing power is an example of nature worship. Druid, Wiccan, and Hindu religions all include some form of nature worship. In Western society, most people tend to ignore “non-scientific” forms of Naturalism. Naturalism disguised as science is actually Materialism. In this regard science ceases to be a technique for analysis and becomes its own religion in the minds of its many followers. We commonly just add the word “Evolutionary” in front of whatever science discipline we like and suddenly the field of study takes on Materialist presuppositions.

Intelligent Design (ID) is another mid-spectrum belief system. ID includes belief that the universe and life as we observe it today were designed by an intelligent mind. ID can best be thought of as the agnostic approach to origins. ID does not claim to know who or what the intelligence is, but those who accept ID do not accept pure Materialist explanations for origins either. ID is a convenient label for anyone who does not take Genesis or Darwin at face value. As such, many Creationists tend to reject ID because ID does not believe in the God of the bible. Many Evolutionists reject ID because it accepts the possibility of God and thus rejects the Materialist foundation for Evolution.

Science is a technique, not a belief system. Some people think science is a religion, but all science can do is help us understand how things work. Science is impersonal. Beliefs are personal even when what you believe in is impersonal.

Science is concerned with causality (cause/effect relationships). A hypothesis is a suggested cause/effect relationship. The scientific method requires testing cause/effect relationships to determine if they are true. Tests must be devised which are able to demonstrate whether the cause/effect relationship can be shown false. If the relationship is proven false the hypothesis is discarded. If the relationship cannot be proven false it becomes accepted as theory. When the theory is shown to be true under all conceivable test conditions it becomes accepted as law. The whole point is to be able to make successful predictions about an outcome (effect) under specific circumstances (cause). This helps us understand our natural world and so that engineers and technicians can turn scientific knowledge into useful things.

Science is limited because it cannot directly examine the past. Science also cannot directly examine the supernatural. These limitations mean that science cannot directly disprove Evolution or Creation. We can only scientifically examine natural evidence existing today. The same evidence is available to people of any belief system.

The value of science is found in its ability to make meaningful predictions. The way to apply this is to generate theoretical models and see which model (cause) best predicts the evidence (effect). There are only two basic origin models to consider. The Creation model uses scripture as a basis for prediction. The Materialism model comprehensively uses Evolution, Uniformitarianism, and Big Bang theory as the basis for prediction. Since science ultimately cannot prove or disprove the belief system on which each model is built, ultimately it is up to each of us to choose what we will believe.

2. Religion

“Pure and undefiled religion in the sight of our God and Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their distress, and to keep oneself unstained by the world.” James 1:27 (ESV)

Religion is a behavior pattern based on a belief system. The principle is simple. What you believe drives what you do. Religion is essentially the code you live your life by. This code may include ritual behaviors as well as boundaries for personal behavior. The real question is what code you choose to live by.

The pure form of religion handed down from Moses requires behavior conforming to codes recorded in the Torah (first five books of the Old Testament). Religion based on the Torah recognizes that God is Creator, God is good, and human life is sacred because we are created in the likeness of God. The first chapters of Genesis explain our purpose, the reason for our sin and suffering, and the hope of redemption. Death and suffering are the result of sin. God reveals more about Himself and His purposes, as well as our own history, throughout the rest of the Old Testament. The requirements of holiness given the Torah were fully met in the life of the Lord Jesus Christ. The death of the suffering savior was predicted by prophecy and required for atonement and redemption of sinful humanity. The resurrection of Jesus Christ is victory over the curse of death. The hope of humanity is found in acceptance of this gift and submission to the authority of our Lord. Through this submission to holiness we are set free from bondage to sin and death. Commands given by Jesus Christ concerning behavior are even stricter than those of the Torah. Jesus did not command mere outward behavior, but inward belief as the force driving the behavior.

Nearly every religion, other than Judeo-Christian religion, is based on belief in the power of something created rather than a single holy all-powerful Creator. Ancient pagans deprived of the knowledge of the Creator invented deities to worship in hope of prosperity, protection, victory in battle, and so on. They typically included vague superstitions and required idols, sacrifices, and sexual acts—all designed to prosper those in charge of the religion. Often the ruler himself was deified, particularly when the ruler was victorious in battle or otherwise brought about better living conditions for his people. Pharaoh in Egypt and the Emperor in the Roman Empire were examples of this sort of deity.

In the centuries before Christ a new type of religion began to develop. It was the rise of philosophy. Philosophy elevates human ideas and the power of reasoning. Philosophy becomes religion when the human mind and philosophical rhetoric become the objects of worship. While famous ancients like Plato and Socrates are often cited as the fathers of philosophy, the modern era’s worship of philosophy began in earnest after the reformation in the “age of reason.” There are dozens of famous philosophers who have made contributions, from Lyell or Darwin in natural science to Marx or Hitler in political science. As individuals each of these men have had a huge impact on the world, but in each case the philosophies have transcended the men. Powerful philosophies captivate the minds of men. People put their faith in philosophy. Warriors win hearts and minds through military victory, but philosophers win hearts and minds through mental victory. Just as military leaders like Pharaoh and Caesar are deified, philosophers and their philosophies are deified.

Evolution is an ancient philosophy with roots as far back as Aristotle. Charles Darwin quoted numerous sources who believed in Evolution, including his own grandfather, Erasmus Darwin. Natural selection was a recent but established scientific theory at the time of Darwin’s voyage. Darwin is credited with assigning natural selection the power of originating species. The obvious and intended implication is to foster belief in the idea that less complex (lower) forms of life evolve into more complex (higher) forms of life through purely natural mechanisms governed by chance or fate.

The merits and flaws of Darwin’s theories are to be the subject of later discussion, but the matter at hand is that Darwin’s theory is just a human idea. His notion of evolution through natural selection is a philosophy. The application of tests to determine if natural selection is the cause of increasingly complex speciation is science. Science is always applied as a technique to test the validity of philosophy.

Evolution may be presented as scientific theory, but it is more often simply assumed as fact. Evolution is a philosophy that has become a mainstream belief. Belief in Evolution results in a worldview which in turn drives choices and thus behaviors. Religion is a behavior pattern based on a belief system, therefore Evolution is a Religion.

Creation is religion. Like Evolution, Creation is also a belief and that belief drives choices—behaviors—and so it can rightly be called religion. Technically, Creation and Evolution are both religions and neither are science. Science is merely an impartial technique useful only to test cause/effect relationships. It is ultimately up to the one doing the test to accept or reject the results, however they turn out.

Mixing any other religion with belief in the Creator identified in Hebrew scripture is called syncretism. These beliefs may be called theistic evolution, progressive evolution, day/age theory, gap theory, or intelligent design, but they are all forms of syncretism because they all integrate some Evolution into Creation. By the same token, any time you introduce God into Evolution you dilute Evolution because you dilute faith in the power of nature to guide Evolution. Any time you introduce Evolution into Creation you dilute the Word of God.

Everyone believes something—whether Creation, Evolution, or something between the two. Few subjects polarize people as much as the Creation/Evolution debate. Creationists and Evolutionists each tend to think of the other as deluded. Those in the middle by definition do not accept either extreme and are generally not accepted by those at either extreme. Is there more than one correct answer? It seems highly unlikely. Either God created just as Genesis says, or Genesis is accurate only as allegory, or it is entirely fiction.

3. War of the Words

“And ye shall hear of wars and rumours of wars…” Mt 24:6 (KJV)

War has been waged since Cain attacked Abel. The weapons, strategies, and tactics have varied, but the greatest prize is the conquest of hearts and minds. When you can make your enemy believe as you do, they cease to be your enemy. If you cannot force agreement your only other choice for eliminating the enemy is to utterly destroy them. Failure means the conquered are merely the oppressed. Oppression is failure because eventually the oppressed will rise up against you.

The greatest epic war for hearts and minds is between God and Satan. Our hearts and minds are the objective. Our souls are at stake. We have free will. We can submit to God or Satan. Even in submission, we are not free of the battle. Whether we like it or not, whether we realize it or not, even though most of us don’t think in these terms, we are all on the battlefield. What we believe defines which side we take—or are taken by.

In order to understand this war we need to know who God and Satan are. God is Creator. He is holy and righteous, all-knowing, all-powerful, and present everywhere. God loves His creation and all of His creation is good. As Creator, nothing is hidden from him. Our free will, as well as that of Satan, exist because God made it so. Satan is a created being. He is evil, hateful, and a destroyer. Satan can only know what is revealed to him, has only the power allowed by God, and cannot be everywhere at once. Satan hates man because man was created in God’s image.

Through the lure of temptation to be like God, man disobeyed God. This is commonly called original sin. The result was a curse of physical corruption, pain, toil, and death. Corruption is passed down from generation to generation. All of mankind is subject to death. God’s mercy is to atone for and forgive our sin and by this restore our true likeness to Him. With that restoration comes life without end. Suffering and death end. Because God gave us free will, we have an element of choice about all this. God’s love and mercy to grant sinners every chance to repent is why God waits to execute divine wrath and bring the current system to its end. We can choose to repent and submit to Him or we may remain in defiance. Each choice has its consequences.

Some people believe God does not exist. This belief is called Atheism. Some people choose not to believe in the supernatural realm at all. This form of Atheism is called Materialism. The Materialist believes that material reality (space, time, energy and matter) is the only reality. This is an important distinction only because some people who do not believe in that a divine mind created the universe or life, but do accept some sort of non-material reality. Non-Material Atheists generally dislike religion, but do believe in “non-deity” spirits, ghosts, and sometimes angel or demon sorts of beings. Many Atheists who “believe in” science would classify themselves as Materialists.

Atheism in any form and Materialism in particular conveniently disposes of God and Satan as persons. By eliminating God and Satan, good and evil become irrelevant terms. Morality becomes nothing more than a personal code relative to the individual or society. Heaven and hell cease to be consequences. Good, evil, morality, and objective truth at best become quaint ideas left over from the past and at worst obstacles to unrestrained hedonistic (selfish pleasure) behavior. The Christian would typically say that choosing to believe God, Satan, Heaven and Hell do not exist does not mean they don’t. The Atheist would typically say that choosing to believe God, Satan, Heaven and Hell exist does not mean they do. Either way, what we believe is a personal choice.

The point of drawing all these distinctions is to understand there is a war between Christianity and Atheism, why, and what is at stake. Since both sides believe they are right, consider their objectives and the importance to each side to draw converts from the other side.

Christians open the bible and read the commands by Jesus to love and to go and make disciples. These last words of Jesus before ascending are a compelling motivation to Christians to go out and seek to persuade people to believe as they do. The primary and most compelling evidence for Christianity is personal testimony. When a person becomes a “born again” believer, they experience a change that affects them profoundly. They become generally more altruistic and tend to conform to a more objective moral code. In Christian terms this is called “the fruit of the Spirit.”

There can be no doubt that great evil has been done in the name of Christianity. Genesis teaches that selfishness leads to all sorts of immoral choices. Adam and Eve wanted to be like God. Cain wanted to be esteemed by God like Able. Abraham was afraid for his life so he prostituted his wife. Jacob wanted a pretty wife and when he didn’t get his way he stole her and ran. If these men, each who claimed to have spoken directly with God, can carry out such sin motivated by such selfishness, consider what people without belief in objective morality do. Any belief system free of object truth and morality allows and generally encourages individuals to put themselves ahead of others and in particular to put the local group ahead of outsiders.

The primitive church experienced incredible persecution and a great deal of martyrdom as the pagans sought to oppose what they perceived to be a threat. A combination of love demonstrated, personal experience and testimony shared, and rational dialog on sound doctrine—all working under the power of the divine mind of God—changed the world. Unconverted pagans hated the idea of objective absolute standards for morality. The Christian ethic starkly opposed the pagan hedonism. In spite of this and in spite of the power of majority of the population being pagan, the Christians began to win over the hearts and minds of more and more people. Eventually even the ruler of the Roman Empire accepted Christianity. When that happened, masses of people followed the lead of their Emperor.

The war against Christianity did not end with Constantine’s conversion. Even though much of the population of Europe was at least marginally Christian, there were still wars, famines, and other tragedies through all the long centuries since. Islam arose a few centuries after Constantine and eventually war broke out between Islam and Christianity. Eventually Islam was beaten back from Europe, yet it held together as a religion with ferocious intensity through the centuries since the crusades. After driving back the Muslims, the Roman Catholic church eventually came under attack from within its own ranks. Men like William Tyndale, Martin Luther, and others in their footsteps set about the task God gave them to reach out to the hearts and minds of average people with the good news of the gospel. It may sound odd, but the reformers believed the Roman church had lost its way, replacing the rule of Christ with the rule of Church. Even within the ranks of Christianity there was war for the hearts and minds of men and women.

Even as the Christian reformers were fighting to replace the authority of the Pope with the authority of Christ, a reformation of a different sort was emerging. The pantheism and mystery cults of ancient paganism were being reformed by the powerful influence of new philosophical rhetoric. The age of reason, age of enlightenment, or whatever you want to call it, began around the same time. Learning was coveted. With the church no longer being the sole proprietor of higher education, people began looking more to science and materialism for the answers to life’s problems. Even though most of the great scientists of this period were Christians, there were also many philosophers who used science as a means to repackage pagan ideas.

A new war began. The war was started by pagan philosophers using the name of science to gain legitimacy. Some such philosophers gave the public impression of Christian faith in order to avoid alienating their audiences, but others were openly atheistic. Science by definition can only be applied to the material universe, but it is the philosopher who makes the leap from limiting the scope of science to limiting the scope of reality.

In the early 19th century two philosophers emerged who made great contributions to the cause of paganism. First, Charles Lyell. He articulated a philosophy called “Uniformitarianism.” Lyell applied his beliefs to geology to draw the conclusion that the age of the earth is very great. Uniformitarianism is the belief that the earth is essentially unchanged over vast time periods. The idea allows for only localized catastrophes, but no major planetary changes in climate, geology, and so forth. Uniformitarianism refuses to believe in the planetary flood of the bible, instead seeking to explain geological columns, layers of sediment, and other geological phenomena in purely materialistic terms. The fossil record is as integral to Lyell’s geological theory as it is to Darwin’s vision of Evolution.

Charles Darwin was the other philosopher who gave paganism its greatest boost. Building on the work of Lyell just a few years earlier, Darwin spent years observing geology as well as biology. Starting from the premise that the earth is very old and that the fossil record proves the antiquity of the earth (compared to the biblical record), Darwin used the principle of natural selection as the centerpiece of what is today simply called “the theory of evolution.” Starting with the belief that great ages are available in which natural selection can work, Darwin suggests that through the process of natural selection new species would develop and over time become distinct. Given enough time, the process would allow development of all the many various forms of life we have today.

Even though particulars of Darwin’s theory have been shown to be substantively wrong, the foundational belief underlying the theory—that life can be explained by purely natural mechanisms—is alive and well. Likewise, even though many of the particulars of Lyell’s Uniformitarianism have been demonstrated false, the underlying premise that the earth is indeed extremely old remains solidly in place in the minds of many, even among the scientific community who reject many particulars of Lyell’s theory.

Beyond the surface of the earth, the work of Einstein and Hubble have been used against the Genesis record in support of Lyell and Darwin. Einstein showed the universe is expanding. Hubble built on Einstein’s theory to show that the distance to other stars requires the universe to be vastly older than the biblical account allows. The field of astronomy is relatively new and fertile ground for Atheism’s war against Christianity.

In the modern era many perceive the war to lie between religion and science. This is true in only a superficial sense. To understand the true nature of the war, we need to understand that Christianity and Evolution are both religions. The Atheist position is that Christianity is the religion and Evolution is science. They have been highly successful promoting this concept because religion is perceived as superstitious and science is perceived as rational and reasonable. Genuine science is rational and reasonable, but neither Evolution nor Creation is science. They are both belief systems.

Science is a technique for testing theories of causality. By using each belief system as the basis for a theoretical model, elements of each model can be put to the test. While neither Evolution nor Creation can be tested directly, the predictions of each model can compared with the evidence observed. It is to this purpose I am now set and to this purpose we embark together in our journey to explore the realms of numerous sciences to test which belief system’s model best predicts what we observe.

4. Why?

“Choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve…but as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.” Joshua 24:15.(NKJV)

Does it make any difference what you choose to believe about origins? If not, then this document and every assertion made by anyone with any belief about origins is wasted. If it does matter, then why?

Either there is a Creator or there is not. If there is, then the Creator is either impersonal (deism) or personal (theism). Belief in a Creator provides hope and purpose. Without a Creator the question, "why are we here?" is left unanswered. If there is a Creator, then there is hope for finding out that answer and learning our purpose. If there is a Creator and He is personal, then perhaps he has revealed the answers to these questions already. Belief in the reality of Creator is not the same thing as saving faith, but scripture suggests the belief that God does not exist makes the prospect of salvation from sin and the gift of eternal life unlikely.

There are many practical reasons to seek an answer to where we come from beyond those stated in scripture. After the essentials of air, water, food, and shelter, humans need love and purpose. We need a sense of value and purpose for our mental health. Without it we are negative, fatalistic, and depressive. It is a basic human need to believe in a Creator because we derive a sense of hope from the idea we were created for a purpose. Beyond this very basic mental health need, we need to have some grasp of where we came from in order to have an idea where we are going. God reveals our origin, our destiny, and our purpose for the present through scripture.

Morality is another practical reason to consider origins. Morals are standards for right and wrong behavior. Morality is the overall set of codes we observe for right and wrong. The codes of right and wrong given in scripture are objective absolutes established by God. Any other codes are subject to the human author. This means human morality is subjective. Standards set by one person vary from the standards of another. This means that standards vary relative to the individual. This is called moral relativism. In a society, when biblical morality is dropped, then whoever controls society establishes the standards. We are told by evolutionists that we should accept Evolution because it is scientific and reasonable, but suppose this is not true. I believe the real reason to accept Evolution is to deny God. The principle reason for denying God is to deny moral absolutes that hinder the desires of the flesh.

It is worth noting that many Christians add Evolution to their faith because they have been made to believe Evolution is scientific fact. A number of theories are presented to pacify those who feel conflicted, but each such theory does not stand up to scrutiny. The intention here is not to slam those who hold these beliefs, but to point out that these beliefs are neither biblically nor scientifically sound. Purely natural (atheistic) Evolution makes more sense than belief in a God who lied about the facts in His revelation of Genesis and who used countless ages of death to perfect humanity only let them fall from grace anyway.

To function properly, the human mind seeks a sense of order. When we spin around quickly we get dizzy and loose our bearings. Most of us fear the unknown because our minds cannot make sense of the unknown. We are thrilled by magic tricks and secretly try to figure out how they are done because we know there must be a logical reason why the trick worked. Our minds require a sense of order. Scripture tells us that God is a God of order. He created the universe and all life in a few days and it was all very good. It was orderly. Disorder, destruction and death entered only after God was rejected by His own creation. Adam and Eve hid themselves because they sensed the order of things was upset. God’s word tells us that death results from disorder. Evolution is the belief that order rises from disorder and that with time and chance anything is possible. Scripture teaches that all things are possible through God (Mk 10:27). Creation is the belief that a divine supernatural mind we call God established the initial order and without His intervention time and chance will only lead to destruction, chaos, and death. Our beliefs about our origin dictate how we must interpret the order and disorder we observe around us.

Either scripture is the revelation of God by God to and through men or it is a human invention. If true then there is a God who creates and who loves us and has a plan for our good. If scripture is a human invention then there is no God, no savior, and no known purpose or hope beyond our last breath. We can claim to believe in Jesus Christ, but what does faith really mean if we reduce Creation to allegory? When Creation becomes no more than a moral lesson, we remove its power and ultimately nullify the gospel itself. Jesus Christ referred to events recorded in the early chapters of Genesis as literal history. His first public miracle recorded by John is the creative act of turning water to wine. Infinitely more important, Jesus died as a sinless atoning substitute for sinful humans who would repent and believe. Evolution claims that God is a human invention. If God is an invention, sin must also be an invention. Evolution claims life originated millions of years ago and that humans lived and died long before the concepts of God and sin entered the minds of men. The bible plainly teaches man and all animals and plants existed before sin entered the world and before human (and presumably animal) death took place. The contradiction is vast and not easily dismissed—even by those who seek to compromise scripture with the popular notion of Evolution. If death existed before sin, sin cannot be the cause of death. If sin doesn’t cause death, the death of a sinless man cannot possibly have atone for sin. Evolution nullifies the entire gospel message. Creation is the basis of the entire gospel message. What we believe about our origin matters.

5. Materialist Origin Model

“But there were also false prophets among the people, even as there will be false teachers among you, who will secretly bring in destructive heresies, even denying the Lord who bought them, and bring on themselves swift destruction.” 2 Pe 2:1 (NKJV)

Models are useful in science because they allow us to apply tests to a conceptual framework. Results are interpreted in terms of supporting or falsifying the framework or some part thereof. In the case of theories about origins, the best we can hope to do is see if the evidence we observe in the present is predicted by the theory about the past origin.

The Materialist model is built on an interlocking set of philosophical theories. The most significant of these are Evolution, Uniformitarianism, and Big Bang theory. Taken together, these philosophies form an overall model describing the origin and development of the universe, our planet, and life. It is important to keep in mind that these philosophies are nothing more than concepts invented by people.

The Materialist model requires origins came about through purely natural mechanisms with no supernatural influence or guidance of any kind. This include the universe, our planet, organic life, and organization at each of these levels.

The Big Bang theory is the most widely accepted theory for the formation of the universe as a whole. Big Bang theory suggests that all matter and energy came from nothing or else always existed, but either way that there was an initial explosion and out of that blast came the matter and energy we observe now. Big Bang theory accepts Einstein’s theory that space itself is expanding. Since the universe appears isotropic from our vantage point, we are either very near the center of the universe or the universe has no center and thus no boundary. Big Bang theory applies the Copernican principle which says we are not in any special or privileged location within the universe. In other words, Big Bang theory predicts we are not at the center of a bound universe but rather we are nowhere in particular in an infinite yet expanding universe.

Thanks to the groundwork laid by Einstein and Hubble, distance to extremely far away galaxies can be calculated. The most distant objects we can observe are nearly 15 billion light-years away. Since we can see objects near this distance in all direction, the diameter of the observable universe is about 30 billion light-years. The reasonable assumption—based on the Copernican Principle being applied to these observations—is that the universe is at least 30 billion years old. This time scale is useful to the philosopher who wishes to see vast ages made available to support the time required to form the earth and evolve life.

Materialist astronomers suggest our local solar system was born of swirling supernova debris something like 4 to 5 billion years ago. There are different theories about the origin of our moon and many of the details of our solar system, but there is general agreement among Materialist scientists that the sun coalesced into star form before the earth cooled into its present planetary form. Over a few billion years earth cooled and eventually the water and atmosphere stabilized to the point at which it could support life.

Charles Lyell published Principles of Geology in 1830. In it, Lyell wrote about his idea of Uniformitarianism. He believed that the geological processes we observe today have gone on essentially uniformly since the beginning of time. Lyell’s theory says there has never been a time when the entire surface of the planet was under water. Geological layers, particularly those layers including fossils, are the result of build-up over time. Many small events, such as local floods, glaciers and volcanic activity have occurred. Except where later events have churned the rock, lower layers are older than higher layers. This means lower fossils are necessarily older than fossils closer to the surface.

Evolutionists following in Darwin’s footsteps pursue a natural explanation of how life arose from non-life. This particular pursuit is called abiogenesis. Since life must have arose from non-life by natural means, the only question is how. Although the answer is elusive, evolutionary science is determined to learn how it happened if for no other reason than to prove the Creationists are wrong. If a process for abiogenesis were discovered, its proponents hope that we could learn how to control the process in order to engineer organisms for specific purposes. Some of these purposes could be noble, such as curing disease or cleaning up oil spills. Maybe some type of organism capable of surviving the harsh Martian surface could be used to generate a breathable atmosphere so man could eventually colonize space. At a minimum it makes for a good science fiction story. On the darker side, the ability to engineer life could also be used to engineer biological weapons. No matter how it is used, the ability of man to play God is dangerous—how can we know the consequences of such knowledge?

As Darwin prepared to embark on his famous four-year voyage on the HMS Beagle in December of 1831, he received a copy of Lyell’s book. In 1837 Darwin published his famous sketch of the tree of life. Darwin published his first book about his voyage in 1839, three years after the voyage. In that first publication he wrote more about his geological observations, placing his observations in the context of the principles he adopted from Lyell. In 1859 he published his most well known book, On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life. Darwin published many books, but it was his 1859 book that has made him a household name throughout the world.

Darwin’s published ideas actually pick up where abiogenesis leaves off. Darwin’s idea of Evolution, simply stated, is that natural selection is the process by which mutations are accepted or rejected and that over long periods of time gradual changes take place where basic life forms transition into progressively higher orders. Assuming we start from some basic living organism, the theory of evolution relies on random beneficial mutations, environmental factors, and natural selection to transform life from simple to complex. The original theory has undergone many revisions since Darwin’s 1859 publication, but the essential principle of diversification of life through purely natural mechanisms, remains the heart and soul of Evolution.

Of course there are any number of subtle variations on the Materialist model, but the description above is substantially what is taught almost universally at all levels of public education. These principles are so broadly impressed on the psyche of western Academia that they are also taught in private schools from Christian primary schools to top seminaries. At the start of the twentieth century Creation was taught in schools and Evolution (and its associates like Uniformitarianism) were forbidden. By the end of the century Creation was replaced and forbidden. Is this reversal in popular public belief the result of scientific enlightenment or has the wool been pulled over our eyes?

The Materialism model makes numerous predictions possible. One prediction is that our biology is all we are. Another, that no great flood has ever covered the entire surface of our planet and that the geologic processes observed today are little changed from the remotely distant past. Another, that life arose from non-life through some reverse-entropy (order from disorder) process. Another, that the order of the universe arose from disorder through some other reverse-entropy process. The Materialist model also seeks to explain details like animal extinction, development of human language and culture, and any other branch of science which seeks to explain the past. These and many other phenomena we observe (or don’t observe) are subjects for future chapters.

6. Creation Origin Model

“In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.” Gen 1:1 (KJV)

The Creation model, like the Materialism model, establishes a comprehensive outline of cosmic, geologic and biologic origins. The first chapters of Genesis provide a brief yet amazingly complete foundation for the Creation model. Since Genesis is regarded as revelation from God, any scientific theories associated with the Creation model must not contradict scripture. Although science can only deal directly with material reality, the basic premise still applies: the model makes predictions that either do or do not fit the evidence.

Before exploring the content of Genesis, it is worth taking a moment to consider the origin of the book itself. Genesis is the first of the five books comprising the Torah. Torah, which means “teaching,” also includes Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy. Moses is credited with these first five books of the Hebrew scriptures. One major difference with Genesis is the fact that all of the events in the book take place before Moses was born. This is often a stumbling block for believers and a powerful objection for non-believers. The solution is that Moses compiled older documents into the form we know now as Genesis. Although Moses almost certainly did not write the content of Genesis from scratch, he is rightly called the author because he weaved a literary tapestry from those earlier documents under the direction of the Holy Spirit. Jewish tradition also holds that Moses also compiled the book of Job from pre-captivity documents in much the same way. Whether God guided Moses in the compilation of pre-existing documents or dictated the book of Genesis from scratch, the important point is that God instructed Moses to include Genesis at the front of the Torah. The Torah has ever since been revered as collectively the most holy writings of all time.

Most major divisions in the book of Genesis occur where a phrase similar to “these are the generations of…” The first such division occurs at Gen 2:4 (generations of creation). Everything up to this point must be direct revelation from God. The next section logically includes everything from Gen 2:5 to Gen 6:1a (generations of Adam) and may have been written by handed down from Adam. The next section includes Gen 6:1b to Gen 10:1 and was most likely originally passed down from Noah. The remainder of Genesis most likely came from Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph consecutively.

The Creation model is based primarily on the text of these first eleven chapters of Genesis because they describe the original creation of the universe and life, a planetary hydraulic cataclysm that destroyed life and radically changed planetary climate and geology, and the cause of language and culture diversity. The key points are described below. There are many references to original creation spread throughout scripture. For example, Jesus refers to details in each of these first eleven chapters of Genesis. The opening of John’s gospel draws on the powerful theme of Gen 1:1 with the words, “In the beginning…” John describes the relationship of God the father and Jesus Christ and attributes the act of Creation to the efforts of Jesus Christ. Jesus’ first miracle described by John was the creative act of turning water to wine. Isaiah, Job, and some Psalms are particularly important and will be discussed where appropriate later in this document.

Genesis 1:1-2:4 succinctly describes the process of original creation. Space, matter, time, and energy (light in particular) were created on the first day. A cycle of dark and light were established on the first day. On the second day God caused an expanse to form which divided water. On the third day water under the expanse was pooled into seas and dry land appeared. Plant life formed on the third day. On the fourth day, the sun, moon, and stars became visible as distinct objects in the expanse. Sea, air, and swarming animals were formed on the fifth day. Land animals and man were formed on the sixth day. All plant and animal life is described as being formed whole, complete, and as unique kinds from the beginning.

Gen 2:5-25 gives a detailed account of the creation of the first humans. Adam is described as having language, purpose, and free will. Eve is described as being formed from Adam. Together Adam and Eve are described as the source and example of God’s intended family unit.

Gen 3 describes the presentation of temptation through deceit, original sin corrupting humanity, and the consequence of the curse of death put upon the entire earth. Perfect community with God ended there. A number of lessons may be learned, but the effects of sin and the reason for death and suffering become clear in the context of Cain and Able.

Gen 4 describes the effects of corruption passed along to the first two sons of Adam—self-righteousness, envy, rage, murder, denial, fear and rebellion. A brief genealogy of Cain is given along with scant details about his descendants. Some were farmers and ranchers, some were musicians, and some were mechanics. The few details given are enough to suggest that these earliest people were at least somewhat technically advanced. They must have had some knowledge of mathematics, geology, forging, and animal husbandry and management.

Gen 5 provides a very detailed genealogy of the male descendants of Adam to Noah and his sons. The great life spans described seem incredible by modern standards. Clues in preceding chapters along with information about the flood and its effects on the planet suggest major climate and water cycle changes. These changes are suspected of being the principle cause of reduced life spans following the flood. Great attention to detail is given in this chapter so that we have an account of the exact number of years from original creation to Noah. Since Gen 7:6 indicates the exact age of Noah when the flood occurred, we can easily calculate that the flood occurred 1656 years after creation.

Gen 6-8 describes the flood of Noah. The flood was a planetary catastrophe ending all air-breathing land and air life except what God preserved on Noah’s ark. The waters are described as erupting from beneath the surface and falling from the sky. Noah, his family, and all the animals preserved in the ark remained in the ark for slightly over one year. The cataclysmic violent forces of nature unleashed by God in this flood are a vital to the overall creation model because this flood explains the fossil record and a myriad of fascinating geological phenomena from coal to limestone.

Gen 9-11 is important to the creation model because this series of passages fill in the gap from the flood to rise of early cultures. Gen 9 describes the early post-flood family activity of Noah and his sons. One incident in particular resulted in a curse being placed on the descendants of one Noah’s sons and blessings prophesied for the other sons. Gen 10 is known generally as the “table of nations.” This chapter lists the earliest tribal civilizations which were dispersed in an event described in detail in Gen 11:1-9. Gen 11:10-32 provides another highly detailed genealogy similar to the one in Gen 5. This one, however, details the male line from Noah to Abraham.

Genesis opens with the statement, “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.” This one statement directly confronts, contradicts and refutes all forms of naturalism—Pantheism, Animism, Big Bang, Materialism, Atheism, and Evolution. God is established as the single supernatural mind who personally and purposely created everything.

The creation model makes numerous predictions. The universe had a beginning. Time is not infinite. Neither is matter, energy, or space. There is more to reality than the material universe. God exists eternally—without beginning or end and without limitations of time or space. Time, matter, energy and space came into existence instantly by the force of divine will. Natural mechanical laws (physics) were put in place at the beginning although subject to supernatural manipulation during the creative week. Initially all matter was water with some rotational energy. Light existed before the sun, it was directional, and there was a distinction between light and dark in space. Space began expanding. Earth then became a distinct planet, fully formed, with regions of water and dry land. God then made plant life. Stars, the sun, moon and presumably the other planets in our solar system were fully formed and operating essentially as we see them today by the end of the fourth creative day. Calendar and time keeping methods are made possible by the regular mechanics of our solar system. Like plants, animal life was also created whole, complete and mature by distinct kinds. All organic life has a natural powerful will to procreate and to procreate only within kind. Scripture indicates that all animals have souls, but human life is distinct from animal life in that man was made “in the image of” God. Man was given the specific duty of caring for creation. The first humans definitely had complete oral language and may have had written language. Humans are both biological (body) and spiritual (soul). Humans have free will. All humans today descend from an original single pair of humans.

Initially creation was perfect—no death and no suffering, but suffering and death entered material reality as a result of human sin. A catastrophic flood of water that lasted several months covered all dry land on the planet. All air-breathing creatures except those preserved in a single wooden ark. Almost all fossils and many geological features on the earth today are the result of this flood. All animal and human life existing today descend from those who survived on the ark. Genealogies given in scripture indicate the flood occurred about 1656 years after creation. Genealogies after the flood indicate the flood occurred about 561 before the house of Israel entered the land of Egypt. There is some scholarly debate about the duration of Israel’s stay in Egypt with the maximum period being 430 years, but the departure of Israel is reliably dated (within a decade) to about 1446 BC. Taken together, this means the flood occurred no more than about 4400 years ago and creation occurred roughly 6000 years ago. The vast diversity of language and culture in the world today are the result of the supernatural division of language and dispersion of humans not long after flood.

The following chart attempts to put into perspective some the major differences between the two models for origin processes:

7. Mind Over Matter

“And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul.” Gen 2:7 (KJV)

The contemporary theory of Evolution states that natural selection acts on random chance to favor increased order. On this foundation many evolutionists say man represents the highest form of evolutionary order. This line of reasoning stems from recognition that mankind has mental powers above the animal kingdom.

The Materialism model predicts that the human mind is the result of complex biological functions (primarily if not completely) in the brain. The complexity of the human brain is believed to be the result of Evolution. Evolution, then, is credited with the power and complexity of the human mind which, by definition, is a biological feature.

The Creation model predicts that the human mind was created by the perfect eternal mind of God. Gen 2:7 indicates Adam became a living soul when God breathed (put spirit into) into his body. Genesis predicts that our ability to function as unique persons comes from a combination of material biology and non-material spirituality.

The most important question to address in this chapter is whether the human mind is material or non-material. The idea of God and the supernatural in general are flatly denied by pure Materialist doctrine. Logically, the idea that man is anything more than his biology is also flatly denied. This premise, that we are only our biology, is a fundamental assumption of Evolution. Demonstrating the mind is material will support the predictions of Evolution and Materialism. Demonstrating the mind is non-material will support the predictions of Creation and permit if not require the existence of God.

There are many flaws with the idea that we humans are no more than our biology. One of the most substantial arguments against Materialism and purely natural Evolution is made by the human mind. Either the mind is material (biology) or it is not. There is a great deal of evidence in favor of the mind being something other than biology.

According to Gen 2:7, human beings are part biology and part spirit. God made man in His image (Gen 1:27). We are not some random blind chance process of nature. First, God formed man’s biology. Once the body was formed, God breathed into man the breath of life. The word translated as “breath” is also translated “spirit” or “wind” elsewhere in scripture. Jesus alluded to this likeness of wind and spirit when he told Nicodemus, “The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear its sound, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.” (Jn 3:8, ESV).

Our biology alone does not constitute life. The biology God formed of the earth was not living until God put the “breath of life” (spirit of life) into the body. Only then did it become a living soul. This breath or spirit came from God. Once life came into man, scripture says God spoke with man. This means the first man had a mind with language—a means of communication between the human and divine mind. He had a purpose and a special place in Creation. “Mind” is probably the best single word to describe how man is most completely in the “likeness” of God. We think. We have free will. We experience love, fear, grief, and joy. Thoughts, emotion and will directly affect our biology, but the question is whether these things we associate with the mind originate from our biology alone.

The human brain is an amazingly engineered neurological organ. It is the least understood of all biological systems, but it is easily the most important when it comes to anything we associate with the mind. But are the mind and brain the same thing? The sciences of neurology, psychology, psychiatry, and sociology all argue strongly against it.

To explain how the mind and brain differ, consider a book. Materialism says the book is the storyteller. A non-Materialist sees that the book contains words, but realizes the story told by the book came from an external intelligent author. A Materialist believes we are only our biology and reality is only the physical. A non-Materialist recognizes the human mind is distinct from its biology. The mind uses the brain as the medium to control body functions like speaking or driving a car, but the mind is not actually part of the body. If the body originated from some original, it stands to reason that the mind also originated from an original non-material mind. This need for a non-material cause for a non-material mind is the principle reason for refusal to believe the mind is non-material.

God is self-aware (Ex 3:14). Since man is created in God’s image, the Creation model predicts humans will be self-aware. Evolution does not predict humans being self-aware. Being self-aware means we each experience our world from a uniquely personal perspective. First person personal experience is called “qualia.” Since we are conscious as individuals, we perceive the world around us uniquely.

Artificial intelligence (AI) is a popular theme in Science Fiction. The premise often is that a computer eventually gathers so much information so quickly that it somehow becomes “self aware,” often with horrible consequences (i.e. Matrix, Terminator, Battlestar Galactica, etc.). It makes for great drama for a host of reasons, but the basic premise requires the audience to assume a mind can be purely material. These stories are often fatalistic because the underlying premise is fatalistic—we are no more than our biological programming. Materialism accepts the possibility of self-aware artificial intelligence because the Materialist believes the human mind is merely a highly sophisticated “self-aware” biological computer. With the proper algorithms and input from the environment, a computer can make logical decisions. This is not the same thing as thought. Computer decisions are limited to the logic designed by the mind of a human engineer. Even supercomputers that play chess against grand masters do not think—they calculate. Evolution predicts biological calculators, but what we observe coming from the mind of a human is far from calculation. Human beings are not robots. We love and hate, grieve and enjoy, and experience a range of emotion and thought. These things are simply not possible in any computerized artificial intelligence regardless of how fast, large, or sophisticated it may become.

The Creation model predicts free will (Gen 2:16-17). God tells Adam he can eat of any tree but one. When tempted by Satan’s lie, Adam eats of it anyway. Adam used free will to make a choice. If Adam had no free will he could not have made such a choice. Evolution says we and all the detailed information in our genes are the product of chance and natural selection. In other words, we merely respond to our environment. If our mind is the same thing as our brain, then our brain is only capable of responding to external stimulus. Evolution predicts that thought is no more than a biological function. Thought calculation is performed as directed by biological programming. According to the Materialist, free will is only an illusion.

Altruism is a behavior of self-sacrifice for people other than self and kin. Altruism is often (though not always) associated with spiritual beliefs. Altruism cannot be explained satisfactorily in Materialist terms except as a brain defect. The Creation model predicts altruism. “God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.” (Ro 5:8, NASB) Since we are made in God’s image it stands to reason that we would demonstrate some degree of altruism.

The human mind is demonstrably not the brain although it interacts intensely with and through the brain. Every human brain pattern is unique. Patterns appear different for the same experience in different people or the same person at different ages. Brain patterns can demonstrate if a brain is processing a visual or motor experience, but cannot describe the image or event. Medical doctors can examine the chemistry and even electrical signals of the brain, but to know what a person is thinking the doctor must ask.

The brain is designed for fitness. The mind is designed for truth. The most profound evidence that the mind is distinct from the brain is uncovered in the examination of mental illnesses. OCD, phobias, depression, and a host of other mental illnesses can be treated without treating biology (e.g. pharmacology).

Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD) is a neuropsychiatric disease marked by distressing, intrusive and unwanted thoughts (obsessions) that trigger an urge to perform ritual behaviors (compulsions). The sufferer knows the behavior is damaging, but cannot help themselves. Neurologists learned OCD triggers the part of the brain that reacts to danger, driving the urge to act. The Materialist approach would be to medicate, but the non-Material approach realizes there is power in the mind to control thoughts. Mental techniques, not pharmaceuticals, provide the most effective treatment. The human mind has the power to drive changes in brain chemistry and reorganize its neural pathways to correct “bad brain wiring.” The most effective treatments for OCD are literally mind over matter.

Clinical depression is generally treated with strong medications. The medications, however, have been shown to only slightly outperform placeboes. As with OCD, clinical depression can be conquered using mental techniques where drugs fail.

A phobia is an abnormal and disabling irrational fear. Experimental techniques performed on sufferers of arachnophobia (fear of spiders) were highly successful in reducing or eliminating their fear by treating the mind as a nonmaterial controller of the brain. Changing the mind literally changes the brain.

Perhaps the most powerful and well-documented non-Material effects in medicine is the placebo effect. The effectiveness of a placebo depends on the affliction being treated, but on average placeboes help 35% to 45% of the people as well as real medicines on any given illness. Sham surgery has been shown to be equally effective. Placebos do not work on everything, but when it does work the key is belief. When someone believes they will get well, they generally do. The nocebo effect is the opposite of a placebo and it is extremely negative. The nocebo effect occurs when faith in a medicine is undermined by bad media, poor bedside manner, or other negative input from caregivers. An example of a strong nocebo effect is scaring someone so badly they suffer cardiac failure. The same concept applies with first responders at an accident scene. Encouragement and hope provided by a responder as well personal will power—the desire to live—can make all the difference between life and death.

Telepathy (ESP) and psychokinetic (telekinesis) phenomena are generally called “psi effects.” People who exhibit telepathic capabilities indicate the mind’s ability to communicate over some distance without any conventional form of contact. Telekinesis is another kind of psi effect where a mind is capable of affecting physical objects without conventional physical contact of any kind. Real psychics (people who exhibit psi effects which can be validated in a lab) generally want to avoid attention. A practical application for psychic use is in criminal investigations where a psychic can be used to help find a missing person or some important piece of evidence leading to an arrest. There are countless documented cases where people who exhibit psi effects lead investigators to evidence. Creation predicts that we are partially spirit (Jn 3:8) and thus we are more than our biology. The Gospels records many miracles performed by Jesus. In clinical terms it could be said that Jesus exhibited strong psi effects. Jesus predicted his followers would also exhibit psi effects (Jn 14:12). Scripture gives numerous examples of people who exhibit psi effects who were not believers. Materialism predicts the human mind is restricted to its biology. Psi effects of any type defy Materialism and its biological component, Evolution.

Near death experiences (NDE) indicate the mind is unique from the brain. An NDE occurs when a person experiences clinical death where the heart is stopped and brain function ceases. Brain function ceases within 30 seconds of heart stoppage. Permanent brain damage usually occurs less than 10 minutes after clinical death. Several systematic studies of NDEs have been performed. Most NDEs can be divided into a few common types including out of body experiences, holographic life review, or encounters with deceased people. Many report being led back to their body by a light, a relative, or a friend. Most people who have an NDE lose their fear of death and are fundamentally changed and they become more altruistic. A small percentage of people reporting an NDE described it as negative.

Prophetic dreams and visions provide strong evidence for a spiritual reality in direct defiance of Materialism. Scripture contains hundreds of specific as well as general prophecies. Some were fulfilled moments after being given, some days, some after years, and some after centuries. The biblical test of a prophet is whether their prophecies come true. There are many very detailed prophecies related to the Assyrian and Babylonian exiles found in several books of the books of the bible which came to pass with startling accuracy. There are many more prophecies related to Jesus given hundreds of years earlier that were fulfilled very precisely. There are many charlatans who give false prophecy for personal gain, but there are also those who give reliable, detailed prophecy. Materialism does not predict—and generally rejects –prophecy because it requires the gift of knowledge from a source both non-material and unbound by time. The Creation account includes (thus predicts) prophecy.

People who have a body part like a leg or hand is amputated often complain of pain or other sensations in the missing limb. A purely biological being should not “feel” their missing parts. Reorganization of the brain to accommodate the mind’s need to make the body work in a new way is called “neuroplasticity.” Neuroplasticity would seem impossible if the mind were limited to the purely biological realm.

The first step in the search for cures to mental illness is accepting that while the mind affects biology, the mind itself is not biological. Materialism undermines understanding the relationships of mind and brain. Materialism limits or prevents finding answers for real mental health problems. The limited scope of Materialism leads to false assumptions and dead end or dangerous conclusions. A perfect example of this is the quest for commonality with supposed animal ancestors. Evolution predicts that man descended either from apes or from a common pre-ape ancestor. Evolutionists focus on the similarities between ape and man when making the case for their faith. What Evolution fails to predict is that compared with apes, swine organs are more compatible for transplants and dogs are vastly better companions. Similarities suggest common design at least as strongly as common descent. Scientifically, not much of value can be learned from examining the similarities between man and ape. The differences tell us far more. For example, even though ape and human DNA are very similar, humans have two less chromosomes. A vast gulf exists between the minds of men and apes. Even so, a greater gulf exists between the mind of an animal and the artificial intelligence of a computer.

Substantiating the existence of non-material reality does not prove the existence of God. It does, however, eliminate one of the major Materialist objections. The Creation model predicts a non-material human mind (Gen 1:27, 2:7). The Evolution model predicts a purely biological mind. In this case the Creation model is the better model.

8. Causality

“Do not be deceived, God is not mocked; for whatever a man sows, this he will also reap.” Gal 6:7 (NASB)

It takes very little faith to believe the old saying, “you reap what you sow.” It is common sense. Such a simple saying is taken for granted, yet it has profound consequences. The scientific method is based on cause and effect which in turn is based on this very basic and simple truth: you reap what you sow. If you plant a tomato seed, you get more tomatoes. The whole of science is based on the reliability of cause and effect in nature. Tomato seeds cause tomatoes. Nothing else can cause a tomato and a tomato seed can cause nothing else.

Around 400 AD a Christian named John Philoponus used the basic rule of cause and effect to argue against the Naturalism of his own day. His argument is known today as the Kalam Principle. Kalam literally means “speech” or “doctrine.” The Kalam Principle says that whatever begins to exist has a cause; the universe began to exist; so the universe has a cause.

For centuries it was generally believed the universe was steady state. In general the steady state theory says the universe is unchanging and may be infinite in size, content, and time. There are logical problems with this idea. In the real universe, you cannot add one to infinity because it is already infinite, thus you cannot add a new sun, moon, planet, galaxy, or even atoms. The universe mathematically and philosophically cannot have an infinite past, thus is must have had a beginning. In spite of this practical reality, Materialists supported steady state theory to avoid a beginning. Beginning was regarded as the faulty logic of the Kalam principle. If the universe is eternal there is no beginning, thus no cause, thus no logical need for a Creator.

Einstein’s theory of relativity was demonstrated to be true in the 1920s. Among other things, Einstein’s theory of relativity requires the universe to be expanding rather than steady state. If the universe is spreading out, it stands to reason it was once compact. If that is true, it stands to reason it must have begun expanding from some much smaller size than we observe today. These obvious conclusions form the basis for Big Bang theory—nearly gospel today among astronomers and laymen alike who prefer the philosophy of Evolution. These obvious conclusions also support the Creation model. The application of Einstein’s relativity is, therefore, relative.

Initially Big Bang theory was rejected by the Materialistic science community because it requires a definite beginning. Then something amazing happened. Materialists stopped arguing against a beginning. Instead, they now argue against the requirement for a cause. The very foundation of science itself is causality. It should be obvious that for something to begin to exist it must have a cause. To avoid the requisite “why,” Materialist scientists propose the universe came from nothing by a natural chance mechanism. For lack of a better natural explanation, they suggest such unlikely causes as quantum uncertainties. In any realm of science (other than Materialist cosmology) the idea of uncaused beginning would be absurd. When confronted with the fallacy of their argument, they generally respond with the obvious question: “If the universe has a beginning and a prime cause, and if that cause is God, then who or what created God?” This very question has been raised countless times in opposition to God. The Materialist hopes to create a loop of circular logic demonstrating the flaw in belief in God and confounding the Creationist. The answer is simple and elegant. God is eternal. Since God has no beginning, God requires no cause. God is the prime cause of material reality—time, space, energy, and matter.

Once you reach the logical conclusion the universe was caused, then the philosophical question of why cannot be avoided. Evolution does not presume to suppose an answer to the question of why. Big Bang and Evolution theories are human contrivances. No human observed the beginning of life, let alone the universe, therefore no human can know with certainty how it began. The biblical account of Creation is the divinely revealed answer. Genesis offers not only a brief overview of what God did, but much more importantly it offers us answers to the nagging question why.

Cause may be personal or impersonal. For example, if a wife makes a pot of coffee for her husband, you could explain the cause of the coffee personally or impersonally. The impersonal explanation is that the hot water passes over the grounds to produce the drink. The personal explanation is that the wife loves her husband and made the coffee to please him. When we try to answer the question of the why the universe exists with an impersonal description of how, we fail to answer the real question—why. When we ask why the universe exists, we are really asking why we personally exist. We seek to know the meaning of life. Apart from God’s revelation of Himself and His purposes we cannot possibly exceed human philosophy and impersonal guesswork.

Gen 1:22 is the first of several occasions in scripture where God commands his creatures to be fruitful and multiply. Life is commanded to procreate according to its own created kind (Gen 1:24). God says this is good (Gen 1:25). Humans are unique among creation because we are created in God’s image (Gen 1:27). Humans are given responsibility to manage and care for the rest of creation (Gen 1:28). God endowed mankind with similarity to Himself, the ability to have children, authority over nature, and responsibility to love and care for creation as God loves and cares for us. Gen 2:15 gives a more specific job description—to cultivate and care for the garden. Gen 2:16 shows us that God endowed us with free will and the opportunity to use it to obey Him and remain holy or disobey him and know the sting of sin and death. Prior to the introduction of sin, there was no shame or guilt (Gen 2:25). God established marriage as the foundation of the family and the ideal environment for raising children (Gen 2:24). In all these acts of God we see His divine love revealed as the answer to why we exist and why we do the most basic things we do.

9. Cosmic Organization

“Thus says the LORD, who gives the sun for light by day and the fixed order of the moon and the stars for light by night, who stirs up the sea so that its waves roar--- the LORD of hosts is his name.” Jer 31:35 (ESV)

There are two fundamental natural laws that are accepted as fact universally and which apply to all aspects of nature universally. They are the first and second laws of thermodynamics. These two natural laws, when applied to our highly organized universe, demand a prime cause which is itself apart from nature.

The First Law of Thermodynamics, also known as the Law of Conservation of Energy, states: Energy can neither be created nor destroyed, only altered in form. Matter can neither be created nor destroyed except by nuclear reaction and then total mass and energy are still conserved. The first law essentially states that you don’t get something from nothing. The universe exists. Since the sum of energy and mass cannot be created or destroyed by natural means, if the universe does have a beginning it must have a supernatural cause. If the universe had a beginning, then the Materialist model is contradicted by the simple application of this law. The Creation model explains that mass and energy exist as the result of supernatural will imposed at the beginning.

The Second Law of Thermodynamics, also known as the Law of Entropy, states: In any energy conversion (work) there is a net increase in entropy. Entropy is the amount of energy not usable for useful work. In other words, no energy conversion (work) is 100% efficient. The second law essentially states that what you get back is never as much as what you put in. In simple terms, order progresses toward chaos. Batteries run down and clocks wind down. A nuclear reactor operates because of entropy—the breakdown of atoms giving off heat. The universe is winding down. What we observe when we look into the cosmos is the highly organized ordering of our solar system, our galaxy, and the myriad of other galaxies and galactic clusters in far away parts of our universe. Entropy means that when a tornado hits a trailer park, the debris does not fall together randomly to form a nice new move-in ready apartment complex. Yet, the Materialist model suggests that stars explode and the resulting debris forms new and highly organized solar systems like our own—in our case so organized as to produce and support the evolution of life. Entropy means that nature—organic or inorganic—progresses from order to chaos. The implication is that for any order to exist in nature, nature must be acted on by an external (supernatural) force. Not only is God required for the existence of the universe (first law), but God is required for the organization of existence.

Ironically, the Materialist model fails to predict material reality. The Creation model does predict material reality because it involves a supernatural force responsible for the existence and organization of material reality.

10. Cosmic Evidence

“For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse.” Ro 1:20 (ESV)

We need to get familiar with the evidence before we try to put any of it into either model. The same evidence is readily available for examination to anyone of any ideology, philosophy, or faith. Remember, the scientific method is merely a non-passionate technique for evaluation of evidence.

Einstein articulated the First Law of Thermodynamics with his formula: E=mc2. In a nuclear reaction mass is converted to (or from) energy. Energy from a nuclear reaction primarily takes the form of heat and light.

Light energy travels in the form of photons. Each photon has a specific frequency (wavelength) and a specific amount of energy. Photons move through space at a fixed speed of 300,000 km/second. Even though light does not have mass, under certain circumstances photons can be thought of as if they have mass. This is because they interact with mass. Interactions between photons and mass are critically important in the realm of physics.

Heat is best understood as vibration at the atomic level. At room temperature water is a liquid. In this state the molecules are loosely bound together, but maintain enough freedom to move around. If you remove enough heat, the molecules slow down until they settle into a rigid matrix called ice. If you add enough heat, the molecules break free of each other completely and the result is steam.

Light is vitally important to us because it allows us to see. Heat is vitally important to us because it so profoundly affects our environment. Light and heat are both forms of energy and while most people do not understand their mechanics, everyone appreciates their value.

The universe is organized into galaxies. A galaxy is a large group of stars. Stars are organized into balls of light-emitting matter. Some stars, like our sun, have additional matter organized into solid bodies (planets, asteroids, etc.) orbiting around them.

Stars produce light through a process called fusion. Lightweight elements like hydrogen fuse together under tremendous gravitational force. Two hydrogen atoms become one helium atom and the left over energy is emitted as heat and light. This demonstrates the first law of thermodynamics (conservation of energy) in action. Over time the hydrogen gets used up and as the elements fusing in the sun get heavier, the fusion activity slows down. Eventually a star will cease to be a source of heat and light. The natural burning out of a star is the second law of thermodynamics (entropy) in action.

When a train is moving toward you it will have a higher pitched whistle than when it is moving away from you. Sound waves are pressure variations in the air. When a sound source (or listener) is moving, the pressure waves compress (higher frequency) or stretch (lower frequency). This is called the “Doppler effect.”

Erwin Hubble discovered that light from distant stars is redder (lower frequency) than it should be. This is called “red shift.” He figured out that the redder the star or galaxy, the farther away it is. It is a widely held misconception that this red shift of light frequency is due to the Doppler effect. It is not. Light moves at a fixed rate with fixed frequency regardless of the relative speed at which the source or receiver is moving.

Space expands. Einstein theorized this and experiments since the 1920s verify it. The only way to lower the frequency (redden) light after it is emitted is to expand space. Note that filters (e.g. gels) only absorb certain light frequencies—filters do not actually change light frequency. Einstein showed that the universe is expanding and Hubble showed that red shift, as a byproduct of space expanding, indicates relative distance to far away stars.

Gravity affects space and time. Sir Isaac Newton developed what is commonly called the law of gravity. Einstein redefined our understanding of the nature of gravity when he theorized the relative relationships between time, space, energy, mass, and gravity. Gravity affects space. This is proven by photos taken during an eclipse which show stars appear closer to the sun than they should. Gravity seems to pull the light from the stars closer to the sun when, from our vantage point, the stars are very close to the sun. This can only be observed on earth during a total eclipse. Gravity also affects time. Experiments have shown that clocks running at high altitude run faster than clocks at low altitude. Relative position in the same gravitational field result in a relative difference in the rate of passage of time. The term for this phenomenon is “gravitational time dilation.”

11. The Big Bang Mystery Cult

“But false prophets also arose among the people, just as there will be false teachers among you, who will secretly introduce destructive heresies, even denying the Master who bought them, bringing swift destruction upon themselves.” 2 Pe 2:1 (NASB)

The Big Bang theory is not the only Materialist theory for the origin of the universe, but it is the most accepted. Since Einstein effectively destroyed the Steady State theory, most other Materialist theories, like the Multiverse Theory or Oscillating Universe Theory, still incorporate some form of the Big Bang theory. Before we can critique the theory, we must first understand it.

Big Bang theory is supported by many Christians because, based on the typical layman understanding of it, Big Bang theory seems to require a prime cause which implies God. Materialists are uncomfortable with the prospect of a supernatural prime cause, but those who understand the mathematical and philosophical underpinnings of Big Bang theory can smugly tout it because the real framework of Big Bang cosmology satisfies Materialism. There is quite a bit more to Big Bang theory than simply stuff going boom to produce the cosmos. Materialists, Creationists, and everyone in between needs to be educated about the theory before accepting or rejecting it.

The layman understanding of Big Bang theory is fairly straightforward. All matter and energy started out in a tightly compressed spot. The matter exploded outward to form the cosmos and the stuff we are made of. Hence, the Big Bang. If this were all there was to the theory it would at least resemble the biblical text. After all, scripture indicates God created the universe, expanded it, then put the mechanics of our planet and solar system into place. There are several well-kept secrets of Big Bang theory that are generally unknown to the typical layman. Even most scientists, aside from those with more than undergraduate degree in astrophysics, do not know these secrets.

Prior to Copernicus it was commonly believe that the earth was the center of the universe. Copernicus demonstrated conclusively that the earth orbits the sun just as the moon orbits the earth. Copernicus himself was a devout Christian who had no problem with a heliocentric solar system. Regardless of his personal beliefs, in the minds of later philosophers his idea of a heliocentric solar system reduced the “specialness” of earth’s placement in the universe. Even before the advent of Big Bang theory, the idea that earth is nowhere special in the universe was known as the Copernicus Principle. Rather than describing earth’s location as special, Materialists today promote the idea that we are a very mediocre planet orbiting an average star in an out of the way part of a huge galaxy which itself is nowhere special in an infinite pool of galaxies. Is our location truly unspectacular? Are we nothing more than beneficiaries of extraordinary luck in a game of cosmic chance?

One of the best kept secrets of Big Bang theory is that the universe has no boundary and no center. Thanks to the work of Hubble and those who have come after him, we have been able to see and catalogue galaxies nearly 14 billion light-years away. Thanks to our “galactic bumpkin” location at the outskirts of the Milky Way we have an excellent view of most of the rest of the universe. What we observe appears to be a roughly even scattering of galaxies in all directions. The regular amount of red shift we observe among the most distant galaxies indicates that on average, all distant galaxies are moving away from us. Logic says that if a roughly equal field of objects out to the same distance in all directions are all moving away from you at roughly the same rate, you must be at the center of that field. The technical term is “isotropic.” This intuitive idea drives the layman understanding of Big Bang theory, but there is more to it than this.

Einstein’s relativity includes several parts. One part says that space is expanding. The Creation model and Big Bang theory both predict the expansion of space. The Creation model demands expansion from earth outward, but the Big Bang model does not share this restriction. Einstein’s relativity allows for three basic shapes of expansion. One shape is spherical. A sphere has a center and a boundary. This is how most people visualize the universe. The second possible shape is flat. This shape lays out the universe on a flat plane, infinite in all directions with no center. While centerless infinity appeals to Materialism, the idea of a flat universe has been universally rejected because we observe the universe in three dimensions. The third possible shape is infinitely curved, sort of like saddle. The universe cannot have less than three dimensions, but it may have more than three.

The math gets a bit over our heads pretty quickly, but the basic premise of a universe laid out on an infinitely curl satisfies the implication of the Copernicus Principle. If the universe is curved, the limit of distance we can see may be the result of a horizon on the curve rather than simply the extent of travel outward like a sphere. A way to visualize this is to consider a fleet of ships at sea. A sailor on one ship can only spot another ship up to a certain distance away because the earth is curved. If you were in a fleet and all the other ships headed away from you, each increasing in speed as it got farther away, you would think you were in the center of the fleet when those originally closest to you became the only ones still visible on the horizon. It would not matter whether you were really at the center of the fleet or just at the center of those visible to you. The rationality for accepting more than three dimensions of space is based more on the need to deny being near the real center of bound universe than any real evidence that a fourth dimension actually exists.

By arbitrarily rejecting the spherical model, the center is rejected. Expansion is relative to whatever arbitrary location is chosen to observe from. With no center to the universe, there is no center of gravity in the universe. Without a center of gravity there is no gravitational time dilation in one part of the universe with respect to any other part. A bound spherical universe does have a center of gravity and does exhibit gravitational time dilation. Gravitational time dilation is real—it has been measured using atomic clocks. A clock at sea level will run slightly slower than a clock at high altitude. Although the effect is very small, if applied to the whole universe—assuming it was originally condensed to a small volume—the result would be vast elapsed time at the fringe of the universe compared with the center. The creation model predicts just such an original body with subsequent spherical expansion. Materialism is forced to reject the notion of a spherical universe with a center because the ultimate implication is that the universe may in fact be very young even though distant galaxies appear to be very old from our position.

Big Bang theory requires that the universe was never inside a black hole. Although Black holes can not be observed directly, there is plenty of evidence they do exist. Yet another problem with having a center to the universe is that when all the mass of the universe was closely packed, the gravitational forces would have resulted in a black hole. Space, energy, and matter could not expand under the gravitational force of a black hole. The problem of having a black hole at the center of a bound spherical universe is sufficient cause alone to reject the sphere. The ignition of a black hole effect at the beginning of the universe is actually a necessary part of the Creation model during the first day of Creation.

Most people, including scientists not trained in the mechanics of relativity applied to Big Bang cosmology, think the Big Bang was an explosion of matter that spread out to fill space. The Big Bang model actually requires that the universe has always had roughly homogeneous distribution of matter through space and that space itself has expanded to make the universe appear to be roughly isotropic with considerable distance between clumps of matter (galaxies, solar systems, etc). The expansion of space is integral to its centerless curvature and critical to denial of the black hole effect. The Creation model also predicts the expansion of space, but for entirely different reasons.

Red shift is not caused by the Doppler effect. In normal space light would not change frequency no matter how fast a star or galaxy may move away from us. The Doppler Effect is frequency shift of acoustic (air pressure) waves caused by relative motion of the sound source to the listener. Light is an electromagnetic wave and its frequency is unaffected by relative motion. The only mechanism that can cause the wavelength of light to expand (red shift) is to expand the space through which the light travels. While light has a fixed speed through space, space itself can (at least theoretically) expand faster than the speed of light. Red shift of the most distant galaxies indicates they are moving away from us at as much as five times the speed of light. Such a speed can only mean space itself is expanding.

Hubble calculated the approximate relationship between red shift and distance, known today as the “Hubble constant.” By observing the red shift of distant galaxies, we can calculate the distance to those galaxies. Distant starlight is perhaps the most convincing argument for assigning a vast age to the universe and, it would seem, the vast expanse of time needed for life to evolve. While there is a substantial margin of error in directly measuring great stellar distances, we now observe light arriving from galaxies at distances approaching 15 billion light-years away. Since we can see galaxies that far in both directions, the universe must therefore be at least 30 billion years old. Materialists certainly would like to see Creationists surrender to their superior logic. Distant starlight is predicted by the Materialist model and it does seem to be a huge problem for the Creation model. The simplistic response of some Creationists is to say, “the bible says it so I believe it—problem solved.” This line of thinking is blind and unnecessary. Distant starlight is one of the major problems tackled in the next chapter.

Cosmic microwave background (CMB) radiation was discovered in 1965. CMB can be thought of as weak heat waves. Big Bang scientists claim that CMB is residual radiation left over from the great explosion that started it all. CMB was originally hailed as quite literally the smoking gun for the Big Bang.

CMB is uniform at 2.76°K (about 5°F above absolute zero) in every direction from Earth. The nearly perfect uniformity of the radiation presents problems to Big Bang cosmology. The Smoothness Problem for Big Bang cosmology is the formation of ordered cosmic structures—galaxies, galaxy clusters, and so forth. In 1992 a NASA satellite detected a tiny ripple, about one part in 100,000, in the cosmic background radiation. Big Bang cosmologists claim this ripple accounts for the organization of galaxies. The Flatness Problem is that density of the universe must have been exactly right at the start of the Big Bang. Too dense and the universe would collapse inward, not dense enough and the expansion would have approached infinity almost instantly. It is because of this problem that cosmologists postulate things like dark matter to account for what appears to be inadequate cosmic density. The Horizon Problem is that light coming from opposite directions is so uniform when the light horizon is about 30 billion light-years across. Either the universe has no center and thus must be unbounded or if bounded, we must be very near the center. Being centerless or infinite is a logical problem even if it can be demonstrated mathematically. Having a center is an ideological problem because it implies our location is special—a direct violation of the Copernican Principle which is the ideological guide for non-Creation cosmologies.

Big Bang cosmology predicts CMB radiation is the residual radiation reflected back from the farthest edges of the universe because it was at the leading edge of the universe as it expanded out from the moment of its beginning. Since this radiation comes from the outer edge of the universe it should cast shadows behind large galaxy clusters. Actual measurements show no shadow behind most galactic clusters. The shadows behind others fell within the range of range of normal variation in the background radiation in the entire sky. Perhaps the more profound problem is the idea that heat can be reflected when there is not surface to reflect from as would be the case in the unbound big bang model. The creation model does not require shadows.

12. White Hole Cosmology (and Other Creationist Theories)

“Thus says God the LORD, Who created the heavens and stretched them out, Who spread out the earth and its offspring, Who gives breath to the people on it and spirit to those who walk in it.” Is 42:5 (ESV)

Genesis is not a scientific document, but it does provide enough information to construct a conceptual model useful for scientific study. In addition to serving as a conceptual starting point, Genesis purports itself to be a written revelation given directly and personally by God to man. Since it is divinely revealed we can expect it to still be factually accurate as well as metaphorically true.

The creation account does not attempt to directly answer the technical details of quantum mechanics, cosmic background radiation or red shift. Unlike the naturalistic theories, however, the Creation account does address the profound and inescapable question: Why? If sufficient peace can be found with the “how” of Genesis, the “why” becomes much more acceptable to a rational mind.

God gave us the Creation account to reveal Himself and His love for us. Our purpose in constructing a scientific model is to seek Him, to better understand what He did and why, and to glorify Him. If we try to strip down God’s glory by gaining knowledge, we approach this subject with the wrong motivation. If our goal is to prove someone else wrong with the force of superior truth, we are wrongly motivated. Jesus made it quite clear: he did not come to bring condemnation—those who refuse to believe condemn themselves. It does us no good to be technically correct about Creation if we alienate those who need the Creator. Jesus did not tell anyone to know facts, he instructed us to believe in him and offered his life in exchange for our faith—his resurrection as a demonstration of his authority and worthiness to be our Lord and Savior.

There are several Creationist cosmological origin theories. With each theory we need to ask two critical questions. First, does the theory predict the evidence we observe? Second, does the theory contradict the plain text of scripture? We must assume supernatural action where scripture says, but we should not assume it where it is not justified by scripture just to make a theory work.

According to the Mature Creation theory, God created the light from distant stars so that they would appear mature and distant. This theory, like it geological counterpart theory that God created fossils to make the earth appear older, fails to explain anything. Scripture does not support this theory. It is untestable and it discourages further investigation. Worse still, it suggests God created the illusion that He did not create things according to His own revelation. The logic is circular and it essentially says God intentionally misleads us. This theory offers no technical merit because it excuses without addressing the problem of distant starlight and it does not address red shift or CMB.

The light shortcut theory was put forward by Moon and Spencer in the 1960s. It essentially says that distant starlight passes through shortcuts in space to appear here quickly. This theory is not supported by any scientific evidence and does not address CMB or red shift. It is generally discounted today.

In the 1980’s Barry Setterfield expounded on data from the 17th century and Paul Steidl’s theory that the speed of light was much higher in the past. More recent analysis and new test data show that light speed has not changed (beyond the margin of error of 17th century instruments) over time. Like the theories above, this theory does not address CMB or red shift.

The first Creationist theory to attempt to tackle the problem of cosmic microwave background (CMB) radiation suggested CMB was the result of heating of cosmic dust by starlight. This theory did not address the distance or red shift problems. It also fails to explain CMB outside the plane of our own galaxy.

The most plausible cosmological model available today based on scripture was published by Dr. Russell Humphreys. His model is more complex and comprehensive than previous Creationist theories. His model addresses CMB and red shift as well as distant starlight in scriptural context. The balance of this chapter is dedicated to outlining the major elements of Humphreys’ cosmology model.

Scripture provides a number of important ground rules that any comprehensive Creationist cosmology must adhere to. The following is deduced from the first chapter of Genesis and in many cases with additional support elsewhere in scripture: The universe started out as a rotating ball of water of finite size with boundaries and a center, beyond which is a heaven. Then there was light and a light cycle. Then an expanse formed in the water ball and the expanse was also called heaven. Matter that would become our planet was near the center of this water ball. Planet Earth was a distinct body with land, seas, and plant life by the end of the third day. The solar system was complete and starlight was visible on the surface of Earth by the end of the fourth day. Animal and human life formed on the fifth and sixth days and it was all “very good.”

Humphreys was the first to put forward a fairly complete cosmological model based on the above core propositions given in the first chapter of Genesis. His model is similar to the Big Bang model in that both rely on Einstein’s mathematics. There are two key differences. First, Humphreys’ model assumes a spherical shaped universe (with boundaries and a center)—one of the three possibilities allowed by Einstein. This difference has a profound impact on the approach to the model and fundamentally requires the other difference. The other difference is acceptance of a supernatural force intervening in natural law at specific times and places as described in scripture.

Humpreys theorizes that all natural laws (physics, chemistry, thermodynamics, etc.) were in place and operational the instant material reality (space, time, energy/matter) was created. Since the entire universe was a relatively small ball of water (perhaps 2 light-years across), The gravitational forces present in the water would have resulted in the material universe almost instantaneously forming a black hole. The gravitational forces would have immediately begun tearing the atoms apart in a furious storm of fission and fusion. The energy conversions produced intense natural light in some if not all parts of the ball. Large amounts of the water would be converted to other elements including a great deal of hydrogen, but also some fusion would produce heavy elements. In principle, this effect is similar to the explosion part of the Big Bang theory—at least as it is understood by most people. The rotational force described by Gen 1:2 (the spirit hovered over the face of the deep) was responsible for initiating the dark/light cycle.

On the second day, God intervenes in the black hole compression to produce what some scientists would all a white hole. A white hole is essentially a black hole running in reverse. Matter and light are ejected and space expands outward as the white hole collapses. Unlike events of other days, God does not say the expansion is complete at the end of the second day. The delay of stars’ appearance until the fourth day suggests space expanded for at least days 2 through 4. Since all stars are made up of the stuff from the original water, they all started out relatively close to what would become our planet. Their light did not have to travel far at all to reach Earth. Since they began emitting light at or even before the expansion started, their light was able to reach earth as soon as the white hole finished collapsing into (or very near) Earth.

An important part of Einstein’s relativity is something called gravitational time dilation. This means that clocks run at different speeds depending on where you are in a gravitational field. Lower in the field (closer to the center of gravity) the clock runs slower. Near the edge, the clock runs faster. If you are near the center of gravity, it seems like the edge is running faster than what you perceive to be “real” time. If you were at the edge looking at the center, it would seem like the center was running slower than “real” time. In reality, one second is one second regardless of where you are in the gravity field. Suppose a clock at the center and one at the edge both start out at exactly the same time (12:00). When the clock at the center reads 1:00, the clock at the edge might read 1:15. The difference is not compression or stretching of time per se, but a difference in the rate of time passage due to relative position in the gravitational field.

Gravitational time dilation has been document by synchronizing two extremely accurate clocks at different elevations and observing that time passes slightly faster at the higher elevation. Interpretation of time dilation measurements allows us to understand black hole time and gravity mechanics. Once we understand how a black hole works, we can then understand how a white hole (black hole in reverse) might work. Then we can begin to understand how time dilation would operate on the scale of the universe.

In Stephen Hawking’s A Brief History of Time, he describes what an astronaut entering a black hole would observe (pretending the astronaut is not crushed by the gravity). He also describes what a distant astronomer watching the astronaut would observe. Humphreys quotes Hawking, then goes on to add more. For the sake of simplicity I will paraphrase. Since no light can escape the gravity of the black hole, the closer the astronaut gets, the more of the horizon appears to be empty. If the astronaut is scheduled to arrive at the event horizon (the point beyond which gravity is so intense light cannot escape) at 12:00, the astronomer’s watch would register an hour passing while the astronaut’s watch ticks off the span from 11:57 to 11:58. In the minute it takes the astronaut to get from 11:58 to 11:59, the astronomer’s clock advances a full day. The astronomer never sees the astronaut’s watch reach 12:00. Instead, the light from the astronaut grows redder and redder until he disappears. If the astronaut were looking out, back toward the astronomer’s location, it would seem like the astronomer is running fast-forward, getting faster as the astronaut gets closer to the horizon. Very near the horizon the astronomer would seem to grow old almost instantly. As he crosses the horizon, the astronaut does not sense any change in the rate of time locally, but suddenly he would be able to see light from inside the horizon. At the event horizon, time would seem to nearly stand still compared to objects far from the center of gravity.

In white hole mechanics, the process runs in reverse. As the event horizon collapses to and through the earth, vast ages of time would be passing while only hours or even a day or so passed on earth. Since time would seem nearly stopped on Earth, there would be more than ample time farther out in space for light to reach Earth from the most distant reaches of expanding space. The bible describes the passage of time from the perspective of Earth—the place God created for us to view the universe from. While only a few days passed on earth (Creation days 2 to 4), the universe expanded and light from distant stars and galaxies reached Earth.

White hole cosmology with gravitational time dilation applied to a bound universe with a near-center Earth explains more than distant red-shifted starlight. It also explains CMB. The terrible atomic forces at work on Creation Day 1 generated a great deal of heat. This heat was being generated uniformly throughout the ball. As space expanded out, the residual heat expanded. Space and matter cooled, but a small residual still remains. The heat was generated uniformly from within the original ball of matter, so it is not a reflection back from edge, so there is no cosmic microwave shadow. White hole cosmology better predicts the observed nature of CMB than Big Bang cosmology.

Red shift is the result of the expansion of space. White hole cosmology predicts Earth is near the center of the universe and so we expect to see approximately equal red shift from all galaxies of approximately distance from us. Big Bang cosmology predicts a similar observation, but it requires an additional fourth dimension of space with space being curved like a Pringles.

The Hebrew term translated “expanse” in most modern English translations was translated “firmament” in KJV. Regardless of the English term used, the Hebrew term suggests a flattening or spreading. The concept carries with it the idea of something physical being pulled thin. The phrase “fabric of space” comes from common explanations of Einstein’s relativity where three-dimensional space is viewed as if it were matter. There is no biblical or scientific reason to believe the expansion stopped at the end of Day 2. This is the only day missing the phrase “it was good.” The expansion would have continued at least through the end of the fourth day, probably through the end of the creation week, and very likely continues even now. The expansion of space is also described in numerous other parts of the bible (Job 9:8, Ps 104:2, Is 40:22, 42:5, Jer 10:12, Zech 12:1).

The “Pioneer anomaly” is startling evidence for the current expansion of space. Pioneer 10 and 11 were launched in the early 1970s. They visited outer planets then left our solar system in essentially opposite directions. Telemetry data from the craft indicated they were decelerating at a constant rate as they got farther away. The gravitational pull of our solar system does not account for this deceleration. Scientists have spent years researching the data and considering any and all possible explanations. The rate of slowing is approximately equal to the speed of light times the Hubble constant, a figure that is used to calculate the relationship between cosmic distance and red shift. The Pioneer Anomaly is the first hard data that supports the biblical proposition that the expansion of the universe which began on Day 2 continues. The “waters above” are ever increasing the tension on space-time. Looking backward, the rate of tension increase seen today in the Pioneer data indicates that only a few thousand years ago the time dilation would have been very strong. The Big Bang theory does not explain or predict the Pioneer Anomaly, however the Anomaly is predicted by the creation model.

Galactic organization, whether our own Milky Way or any distant galactic cluster, begs the question of organizer. The problem of galactic organization is really no different from the question of molecular organization in living tissue. It is simply too complex to be explained away by chance. The order we observe must have been put in place on purpose—the second law of thermodynamics rules out the possibility of natural self-organization.

13. The Sun of God

“All things came into being through Him, and apart from Him nothing came into being that has come into being. In Him was life, and the life was the Light of men. The Light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it.” Jn 1:3-5 (ESV)

According to Genesis 1, light existed on earth before the sun was formed. White hole cosmology explains how natural light would have been present at the surface of our planet before in the brief period before the sun was formed. Genesis requires this event to have taken place just a few thousand years ago. Big Bang cosmology, in accordance with Materialist beliefs, predicts the sun formed with or before our planet over a very long period, billions of years ago. In that model our solar system “evolved” from dust into its present form. For the sake of discussion we will call this aspect of non-biblical cosmology “Cosmic Evolution.” It is time now to consider the evidence within our solar system and ask which model best predicts our observations.

The sun contains about 98% of the total mass of our solar system. It is made mostly of hydrogen. The surface at the equator rotates on axis faster than the poles. The core is believed to rotate about once every 27 days. The surface of the sun is believed to be about 11,000°F.

Most stars are not of the energy range, light range, composition, size, or stability as our sun. Near the center of the Milky Way there is tremendous violent radiation making life anywhere near the nucleus highly unlikely. Earth is in the right part of the galaxy, orbiting the right size and composition star at the right distance, at the right speed, with the right solar and lunar gravitational forces, the right magnetic force, the right ozone, the right outer radiation belt, the right amount of hydrogen and helium in the atmosphere, the right amount of oxygen, the right amount of water, the right temperature range, with all the right chemistry to support life. The sun is of the right size (mass, density, volume) and composition to provide a very stable thermal and radiation output. Size also determines the amount of solar gravity. A larger or smaller sun would require Earth to be farther out or closer in, but it would also have a different composition and thermal output that might not be compatible with life. The size and distance ratio also impacts the relatively circular orbit Earth enjoys. If earth’s orbit were too oblong the temperature changes in our atmosphere would be too extreme for life. The odds are considerably lower than one in ten billion of life, yet here we are.

The sun is a giant fusion power plant. It is made mostly hydrogen. The intense gravity causes fusion of hydrogen which in turn releases heat and light. It has a definite maximum life span as a useful fusion engine. As the hydrogen fuel burns it converts to helium. Helium is more dense, but it is also a much less efficient fusion fuel. As the efficiency drops so also heat and light output will eventually decrease. As density increases, size decreases. Although this sounds like common sense, many astrophysicists deny that our sun is currently shrinking, In fact, many claim the sun will swell due to increased heating as more hydrogen is forced from the core to the surface before the late stage burn out causes rapid shrinking. Observations, however, indicate the sun is shrinking at a very small but measurable rate. Visual measurements by astronomers in the 1970s have been largely ignored or discredited on the basis of the measurement methods and solar cycle during the measurement period. Other measurements by different means have also concluded the sun is shrinking. One of the most recent, in 2004, measured gravity waves using spectrographic equipment. Conclusions by independent scientists suggest the sun’s radius is shrinking at a relatively constant rate of 1.5 to 6 kilometers per year (the average is about 2.5 km/year). That rate wouldn’t mean much over 6000 years, but over a billion years it would require the earth to have once been inside the sun’s corona—or else Earth’s orbital distance has been shrinking in proportion to the sun’s lost size. Computations based on real observations do not support this as even a remote possibility. If the sun did not change size and our orbit has not changed, then it seems the light and heat from the sun have not changed either. The sun would have to have been extremely stable indeed to have remained so constant over billions of years. The fuel burn rate of the sun is a matter of considerable debate, but if those who theorize the sun will increase in size before it decreases, then it stands to reason that several million years ago it was smaller and not as hot (at Earth) as now. If that is true then where is the heat needed for primordial soup to create life?

Cosmic Evolution predicts that planets form from the heavy stuff of space dust spinning with centrifugal force out from the dense center where the sun forms. Dust gathers by gravitational pull into small bodies, similar to the solar condensation, then form rock or gas balls. These planets form at various distances from the overall center of gravity (sun). Entropy predicts almost exactly the opposite. Rotational forces should cause the lighter elements to be flung out and the heavy matter should gather into the core. The organization of heavy elements into spheres also defies logic. Even given a strong center of gravity pulling against the centripetal force of the orbiting planets, the organization of dust and debris into nice spheres defies entropy.

The ecliptic is the flat plane where the planets orbit the sun. The orbits of Mercury and Pluto are substantially out of the ecliptic plane compared with the other planets. Many other small objects in the solar system, like comets and asteroids, orbit much farther out of the ecliptic plane. Orbits at extreme angles to the ecliptic present a problem for Cosmic Evolution models, but not for a solar system ordered by an inscrutable divine mind.

Most planetary orbits in our solar system are only slightly oblong. Only a few planets have been discovered orbiting nearby stars, but those which have been discovered appear to have extremely elliptical orbits. This suggests our own solar system is vastly better designed to support life than at least our nearest neighbors. The special nature of our system defies the Copernicus Principle.

Venus orbits with retrograde rotation. If the solar system formed as Cosmic Evolutionists suggest, a body with retrograde spin should not be possible and if it did happen, its orbit should decay until it falls into whatever it orbits. In the case of Venus, it should have fallen into the sun long ago. Never the less, Venus is in seemingly stable orbit. Uranus’ axis lies nearly parallel to the ecliptic—another peculiarity that should not be sustainable for billions of years. A number of moons orbiting outer planets have retrograde rotations. Triton, a moon of Neptune, has a strong retrograde rotation. Over billions of years moons like Triton should have long since crashed into their host planet. They have not. Although retrograde rotations are problematic for Cosmic Evolution, they are no problem at all for a solar system only a few thousand years old.

Comets are essentially dirty snowballs in space. Hundreds of comets have been catalogued. Many comets have extremely elliptical orbits at angles far off the ecliptic plane. Comets appear to have tails. The tails are made of dust and ice that break away from the core and fall out, trailing and eventually dispersing. As comets pass near the sun, its heat melts some of the surface of the comet. This in turn increases the deterioration of its core. As the debris drifts out into the tail, the melted debris drifts apart, some of which eventually falls into the sun due to gravity. Eventually any comets that pass nearer to the sun than Earth would evaporate completely and disappear. Comets do not present a problem for a young solar system, but there should be few if any comets left at all in the solar system after billions of years.

An asteroid belt orbits along the ecliptic between Mars and Jupiter. Its origin is unknown and it presents no significant danger to Earth. It seems odd that such a debris field would remain intact over billions of years. This asteroid belt does not appear to be the main source of meteors. Other freely orbiting asteroids pass through the rest of the solar system on and off the ecliptic plane, often with highly elliptical orbits.

Most if not all planets and moons have the tell-tale pock marks of meteorite and asteroid impacts. Earth is no exception. There are giant craters in very diverse places around the globe. A popular Cosmic Evolution theory for dinosaur extinction is that a giant asteroid hit the earth and the resulting cloud cooled the surface resulting in mass extinction of the large beasts. Although there is clear evidence of impacts on Earth, there is no compelling evidence that any of these could have thrown enough debris into the sky to cause plant and animal extinction on a planetary scale. Amazingly, Earth does not have anywhere near the number of impact sites observed on other planets or our own moon. The “dark side” of the moon is very heavily covered in craters compared with the side facing Earth.

It is theorized that an as yet undetected debris field far out beyond Pluto’s orbit called the Ort Cloud is the source of a relatively constant flow of new comets, meteors and asteroids. The Ort Cloud has yet to be observed and theories about how it spews debris into the interior of the solar system, if it exists at all, are far from being proven. This imaginary source of comets and other natural debris is needed to satisfy Cosmic Evolution, but is not required by the Creation model.

The moon is about ¼ the size of the Earth and orbits at an average of about 250,000 miles away. The moon orbits the earth every 29.5 days. Except for a small amount of wobble, the same side moon always faces Earth (the other side is called the “dark side”). The dark side is heavily cratered compared to the near side. The moon has no magnetic field. Lunar chemistry is fundamentally different from earth chemistry.

According to Gen 1:14-19, God made the moon on Day 4. There are three Cosmic Evolution theories for the origin of our moon. The “daughter” theory says that the moon broke away from the Earth at or shortly after the formation of the solar system. Rock samples from moon landings show that our moon’s chemistry is fundamentally different from the Earth. Lunar chemistry invalidates the daughter theory. The “wife” theory says the moon is just a giant asteroid captured by earth’s gravity. This would explain the moon’s unique chemistry, but it creates a whole list of other problems. The moon’s nearly perfect orbit with the same side always facing earth is fantastic. The moon is as nearly a perfect sphere as the earth. Scientists generally agree that spherical bodies in our solar system are the oldest. An asteroid from elsewhere should be pock marked all over its surface, but the dark side is much more heavily cratered than the side facing earth. The “sister” theory says that the earth and moon formed together when the solar system formed. It only superficially addresses the problems with the first two theories. This theory does not require like chemistry and it addresses problems with the difference in cratering.

The biggest problem with each of the Cosmic Evolution theories is the need for the lunar orbit to be at perfect equilibrium. It must remain the same distance from Earth over billions of years. The moon is known to be moving away from Earth at an average of several inches per year. At 6 inches per year, it would take close to 10,000 years to drift a mile—not a problem for the Creation model. At 1 million years it would have to have drifted 100 miles. Such a change would radically impact ocean tides. 1 billion years ago the moon would have been 10,000 miles closer to earth and that would be close enough to affect tectonic plates. Aside from tidal problems, if the moon were just a few thousand miles closer it would have crashed into the earth instead of drifting out. The math is actually much more complicated since distance and orbital rate are not linear, but suffice it to say even the small increases in the moon’s orbital distance we see today present an incredible problem for an Materialist theories.

The moon is needed, if for no other reason, to generate and maintain the tides. Without tidal force the oceans would have no circulating currents and probably no life. Ocean currents drive wind and push the water cycle along.

When the moon passes between the Earth and sun it casts a shadow on a small area of the Earth. This is called a solar eclipse. This can only happen during a “new moon” and then only when the earth and moon are perfectly aligned on the ecliptic plane. When Earth passes directly between the sun and moon, the shadow of the earth is large enough to completely hide the moon in lunar eclipse. If the moon were even slightly bigger or smaller (or if it were much farther out or closer in), neither type of eclipse would be possible. Without near perfect solar eclipses, a number of astronomic measurements that have proven critical to our current understanding of the solar system and the universe could never have been performed.

14. No Place Like Home

“The heavens are Yours, the earth also is Yours; The world and all it contains, You have founded them.” Ps 89:11 (ESV)

Earth testifies to its youth in many ways. Some are vague—requiring something less than billions of years—while others much more emphatically demand a maximum age of just a few thousand years. The popular scientific community conveniently ignores much of this evidence, but the glory of Creation cannot be silenced. Jesus said that if we were silent the stones would testify (Lk 19:40).

It takes 24 hours for Earth to make one rotation. We call this period a day and we mark each day with a date on our calendar. It takes a little more than 365 days for Earth to make a complete orbit around the sun. Earth’s orbit is only slightly oblong. Earth’s axis for rotation lies about 23 degrees off the ecliptic plane. From the Northern hemisphere, the axis appears to point almost directly at a star we call Polaris, the “Northern Star,” which can easily be found at the end of the Little Dipper’s handle. Earth has an atmosphere—breathable air—composed mostly of nitrogen and oxygen with a small amount of carbon dioxide and traces of other gasses. Water (mostly liquid) covers about 2/3 of the surface with dry land covering the remainder. Heat from the sun and tidal forces from the moon maintain the water cycle—evaporation, transportation, condensation. Landmasses are associated with tectonic plates. Earth has large areas of hot liquid in its interior. Some of the molten material reaches the surface through volcanoes. Polar regions are cold, but support limited life. Most plant and animal life thrives in the temperate and equatorial zones. Earth has a strong magnetic field. The Creation model predicts most of these characteristics directly or indirectly. The Materialist model fails to make most of these predictions and in some cases strongly predicts something very different.

There’s a law in science that says an object in motion tends to remain in motion until acted on by another force. This applies to spin as well as straight-line motion. Our planet is a large spinning object. As described above, it takes 24 hours for Earth to rotate one time. There are two forces that drag against Earth’s rotation. The major drag is tidal force, but our magnetic field interacting with solar wind also produces a small amount of drag. Over time, the drag from these forces slow our rotation. The amount of drag is very small, but over an extremely long period it would have a major affect on our planet.

In the late 19th century Lord Kelvin calculated that the tidal effects alone would decelerate Earth’s rotation rate by half over roughly 7 billion years. In other words, a day would have been 12 hours long a few billion years ago. Doubling the rotation rate would cause four times the centrifugal force as present. Kelvin figured this much force should cause the equator to bulge 86 km more than at the poles (sea level is today 21.5 km higher at the equator). If the earth had cooled and consolidated as much as 1 billion years ago the land masses should be several miles above the sea at the equator and all the water should drain to the poles. What we see is relative symmetry of continents and oceans with one continent being at the South Pole. This suggests Earth cannot possibly be more than a few hundred million years old. Drag created by solar wind and motion of fluid regions inside the earth mean the earth is almost certainly slowing faster than Kelvin calculated. This further reduces the upper limit for Earth’s age. A related problem for an old Earth is the fact that some continents run North and South rather than East and West as would be predicted by an old Earth, even had it cooled relatively recently. The size, shapes and locations of continents demand a relatively young Earth (compared with the popular theory of billions of years). Over a few thousand years the difference in the length of a day and the amount of bulging would be negligible.

Earth’s orbit is only slightly elliptical. A relatively circular orbit provides relatively consistent heat and radiation. Extreme variations would make life extremely difficult or impossible. Earth is closest to the sun when it is summer in the Southern Hemisphere and farthest away when it is winter in the Southern Hemisphere. Oceans dominate the Southern Hemisphere. Air over water tends to stay cooler in the summer and warmer in winter. The result is that the temperatures in the Southern Hemisphere are much more stable than they would be if it were dominated by land like the Northern Hemisphere. The Northern Hemisphere is closer to the sun in winter and farther away in summer. The effect causes more stable temperatures in the Northern Hemisphere where there is much more dry land. Earth’s orbit seems “engineered” for high performance. The quality of appearing engineered is predicted by the Creation model, but seems to beat the odds in the random chance model.

Perhaps it is only a convenience that Earth’s axis points almost exactly toward Polaris, the Northern Star. Perhaps it is merely good fortune that Earth tilts enough for seasons, but not so much that livable regions are in total light or darkness for half the year. More tilt and the polar freezing would extend much closer to the equator during winter and the poles would tend to melt during summer. Less tilt and seasons would be less pronounced or nonexistent. The change of season is important for the air and water cycles. Any change in tilt would impact animal life and would radically affect plant life. Is Earth’s tilt the product of extraordinarily good fortune or good design as predicted by Gen 1:14?

Gravity is one of the least understood forces in nature. Newton showed that gravity is related to the density of a body of matter. Einstein took it further by showing light and space are affected by gravity. Any change in Earth’s mass would cause a change in the amount of Earth’s gravitational force. Gravity affects Earth’s orbit rate and the rate and distance of the moon’s orbit. Even a small change in our gravity would have a profound impact on our atmosphere resulting in an atmosphere either too toxic or too thin for life as we know it. The precision of our gravity is yet another finely engineered universal quality.

The composition, density, and layering of Earth’s atmosphere is ideal for life as we know it. Too much oxygen, for example, and the atmosphere could spontaneously burn. Not enough oxygen and most life could not exist. More or less carbon would radically impact the CO2 levels. CO2 levels impact the ability to form water droplets, thus clouds, in the lower atmosphere. Cloud cover directly impacts heat capture or reflection in the lower atmosphere. The ozone layer and upper atmosphere chemistry interact with Earth’s magnetic field, solar wind and cosmic radiation to regulate radiation and temperature on the surface along with cloud formation and overall weather patterns.

Earth’s surface temperature is at or near equilibrium. Our planet gives off about as much heat as it receives from the sun. The interior of our planet is hot, but the crust is an excellent insulator. Very little of the interior heat is conducted to the surface. If the surface of the earth was once molten, as the Big Bang / Uniformitarian model predicts, its excess heat would have radiated into space. Once the surface cooled enough to form solid rock, the surface temperature would have dropped rapidly. The rate of cooling is relatively easy to calculate using known thermal laws and coefficients. Working backward from the thermal gradient in crust rock today, Lord Kelvin calculated that the entire surface of our planet would have been molten rock no more than 24 million years ago. This calculation has never been seriously challenged. Some scientists have supposed that radiation inside the earth accounts for the thermal gradient, but neither Kelvin’s own calculations nor any other scientist since has been able to show how this could account for the small but measurable thermal gradient observed today. The Evolution model requires vastly greater than 24 million years of equilibrium planetary surface conditions—or their estimates for the evolution of life must be very wrong. The Creation model predicts solid “dry” surface rock along with liquid surface water and atmosphere on the third day of Creation only a few thousand years ago (24 million years is a maximum, not a minimum).

Earth has a powerful magnetic field. Our magnetic field shields our atmosphere from dangerous levels of cosmic and solar radiation. Data collected for well over a century indicate Earth’s magnetic field is decaying. Analysis of the data shows Earth’s magnetic moment has a half-life of 1400 years. Since energy is a square of moment, the energy is decaying with a half-life of only 700 years. Working backward, then, we can calculate the strength of earth’s magnetism in the past. At 10,000 years the earth’s magnetism approaches that of a magnetic star. A nuclear engine powers the magnetism of magnetic star. There is no known geophysical means of energizing such a magnet inside the Earth within the last 10,000 years. The only logical conclusion is that the upper limit of Earth’s age is 10,000 years and whatever force that started up the magnetic field must have acted on the earth at its development at the time of creation.

Circulating electrical currents in the core of the planet produce Earth’s magnetic field through an effect called electromotive force (EMF). The magnetic field produced by the current forces the electrical currents to decay. At present Earth’s magnetic moment is about 8 x 1022 ampere-meter2. About 6 billion amperes of circulating currents in the core create this field. Electrical energy is decaying at a rate of 813 million Joules/second and this electrical energy is not being resupplied. Knowing the half-life of the energy source is 700 years, and knowing the strength of the field now, we know the magnetic field will be completely depleted in less than 2000 years. The magnetic field does not cause the electric current and there is no known mechanism to store the energy of the circulating currents. This means that once the field collapses, there is no known mechanism for restarting it. Some scientists theorize that earth’s magnetic poles “swap” every few thousand years. This theory is based on blind faith in evolutionary theory: the field has a maximum and it collapses, but Earth is billions of years old, therefore the field must cycle back and forth like the magnetic field of a transformer. A transformer is an electromagnetic device that takes electrical current in one wire to create a magnetic field which induces an electric current into another wire in the same field. Even in a transformer, the magnetic field requires a constant flow of electricity into the source wire. When the source electricity is removed, the field immediately collapses and can no longer produce useful output. For Earth to have a cycling magnetic field it must have some sort of alternating current generator. No such generator is known to exist in the core of our planet.

Not only does our solar system exhibit incredible order and complexity, the physical constants governing it are perfectly tuned. To have the correct combination of gravity, atmosphere, temperature, water, minerals, radiation and radiation shielding, solar characteristics, lunar characteristics, and so forth requires a lengthy list of measured constants to be in perfect alignment. Suppose you had only ten constants that had to be a certain value for life to be possible. Suppose each of these constants only had 10 possible values each, but there is only one correct value each. Try rolling 10 ten-sided dice. What would be odds of getting a 10-die Yahzee on any given roll? The answer is one in 10 billion. There are a lot more than 10 constants to consider and most of those constants, if changed by even 1 percent, would rule out the possibility of life as we know it on earth. All observations of nature from cosmic to nuclear, taken together, suggest our existence is unimaginably unlikely without a designer. If there is a designer then once again we are faced with those nagging questions materialists do not want to ask.

The Creation model predicts Earth is only a few thousand years old. The Materialist model—Evolution, Big Bang, Uniformitarianism—predicts Earth to be a few billion years old. The evidence of Earth’s magnetic field, equilibrium surface temperature with solid crust, and the amount of “bulging” at the equator at our present rotation rate all point to Earth being far too young for the Materialism model, but not too young for the Creation model. The extremely fine tuning of constants like gravity, atmospheric composition, mineral content, ozone, solar and lunar characteristics, orbital period, rotation, axis tilt, continent placement, surface water, and other dozens of other variables point to purposeful design by an intelligent mind rather than incalculably good luck. Application of the first and second laws of thermodynamics requires a prime source of energy and organization present in the Creation model, but lacking from the Materialist model.

15. Catastrophe or Uniformity

In the six hundredth year of Noah's life, in the second month, on the seventeenth day of the month, on that day all the fountains of the great deep burst forth, and the windows of the heavens were opened. Gen 7:11 (ESV).

In 1830 Charles Lyell published Principles of Geology. He believed that the geological processes we observe today have gone on essentially uniformly since the beginning of time. To understand the past, we only need to observe the present. Lyell’s theory forbids the possibility of any catastrophe on a planetary scale. Since we do not observe worldwide catastrophe today, Lyell reasons that no such catastrophe has occurred in the past—at least not since the rise of life. Lyell’s Uniformitarianism is not as widely accepted today as it was half a century ago. Many geologists today recognize that substantial catastrophes have occurred including large regional floods, glaciation, tectonic plate movement, and so forth. Even so, Lyell’s basic premise—which denies a recent global flood—is still regarded as fundamentally sound by many.

Genesis 6 to 9 recounts a hydraulic catastrophe where liquid water covered the entire surface of our planet for a period of several months. This catastrophe is described as violent and sudden. It profoundly affected surface features, atmosphere and climate. The bible indicates only a few people and a few of each “kind” of air breathing animal were preserved through the catastrophe on a wooden ark. Both the flood and the preservation of life through the flood are regarded as divinely caused. Based on the biblical record, the flood is believed to have occurred roughly 4200—4400 years ago.

There are two critical conflicts between Lyell’s theory and the biblical account. First, Lyell’s theory forbids any catastrophe which would have radically affected the type or rate of geological processes on a planetary scale. Second, Lyell’s theory is a critical part of the overall Materialist doctrine of accepting only natural processes—Evolution being the key natural process interlocked with Uniformitarianism. The Genesis flood must be denied, otherwise the ancient text and its allusions to the supernatural are legitimized.

The idea of a supernatural force destroying all air-breathing life except for the people and animals aboard a huge wooden vessel is just too fantastic for many to accept. For others, the possibility of the biblical flood being nothing more than a myth or an allegory is absurd in light of both the testimony of scripture and the geological evidence. The logical question is whether forensic evidence in the rocks supports a relatively recent hydraulic cataclysm or not.

In recent decades geologists have discovered and verified there are huge plates in Earth’s crust. These tectonic plates float on a layer of molten rock called magma. The plates can and do move. Most earthquakes and volcanoes occur along plate boundaries. Scientists have not found anything like our tectonic plates on other planets.

The Uniformitarian model suggests the plates have always moved slowly as they move now. The shapes of the plates and their relative motion suggests they may once have all been positioned together to form a super-continent called Pangea. The mechanism for the original break-up of this super-continent is not known with certainty, although tidal force may be the prime cause. Mountains result from the compression of plates colliding. Oceanic trenches occur where plates pull apart.

The biblical model predicts that originally Earth had shallow seas and low mountains unlike what we observe today. At that time great reservoirs of water were held under great pressure below the surface. At the start of the flood God broke open the “fountains of the deep” like we would crack an egg. The water under pressure found relief in geysers pluming into the upper atmosphere resulting in intense rain for an extended period. At the same time, lateral force against the plates drove them very quickly apart. Some plates collided and in a very brief time drove up great mountain ranges. In other places the plates left enormous open spaces which are today our great oceans. The tensile forces where they pulled apart left very deep gashes in the ocean floor. In these very thin and very weak areas volcanic vents continually churn out magma. During the flood great amounts of magma may have been exposed to the ocean floor. The heat may have been intense enough to cause the flood waters to rise even higher during the initial phase of the flood period. The water would quickly cool the exposed magma back down to form a relatively stable ocean floor. Modern vents remain active primarily because tectonic plates continue to move slowly.

Tectonic plate motion is believed to be the cause of mountains and trenches in both the Materialist and Biblical models. The substantial difference is that the Biblical model supplies a cause, a purpose, and a fairly detailed recent timeline. The Uniformitarian model denies the supernatural purpose and water catastrophe as the causal mechanism.

Uniformitarianism predicts that the overall climate of the planet has remained little changed over millions if not billions of years. The poles have always been cold compared to the equator. The water cycle is essentially as it has always been with evaporation, cloud formation, rain, and runoff back to the oceans. While this model certainly does allow for some variation over time, like changes in currents and jet stream, the grand scheme of things is believed to be essentially constant.

The Biblical model predicts a more uniform climate around the globe prior to the flood. Initially mist rather than rain watered the earth according to Gen 2:5-6. If, rather than rain as we know today, the atmosphere contained a perpetual light mist to water the plants, such an atmosphere would have surely trapped and more evenly dispersed solar heat. The temperature near the poles may have been much warmer. Scripture does not really prohibit rainfall before the flood, but with such drastic and sudden changes as are described in scripture it seems logical that the climate of the whole planet would have been altered by the flood. In the aftermath of the flood, the poles cooled quickly resulting in vast icy glaciers. A number of scientists today dispute the old theory that glaciers must have formed and moved debris very slowly. Soil and rock displacement attributed to glaciation may have actually occurred very quickly and in some cases may be linked to water movement rather than ice movement. In either case, the biblical model does not prohibit ice ages where great glaciers were pressed down from the pole to points as far South as mid-western US states or central Europe. What is prohibited is a period of thousands of years of such ice. The sudden appearance of ice is to be expected in an atmosphere suddenly emptied of most of its water vapor. It probably took a few centuries after the flood for the atmosphere to reach equilibrium with some retreat of ice from Northern regions.

Fossils of animals known to prefer warm climates have been found in rich abundance in polar regions. This strongly suggests a much more uniform distribution of heat around the globe at some point in the past. Hundreds of almost instantly frozen animals have been found in the permanently frozen Northern regions of Siberia and Alaska. Of these, the most well known are the Wooly Mammoths and the Sabertooth Tigers. For many years it was believed the long hair of the Mammoth protected it from the cold, but recently scientists have learned that oils in the animals’ skin and hair function more like hairy animals in the tropics to keep them cool. Mammoths and Sabertooths would have been much more comfortable in the tropics than the polar regions. Evolutionary scientists fail to offer a credible explanation without veering from Lyell’s Uniformitarian model. Creationists offer two theories. One theory is that the creatures were frozen at the start of the flood when the warm water vapor barrier suddenly collapsed. The polar region froze suddenly. The ice at the poles would not have been included in the biblical account since it did not directly impact Noah’s experience. The alternate theory is that there was some lag after the flood before the poles froze over. During that period the tropical Mammoths and Sabertooth Tigers propagated and traveled North, but were caught in a sudden cooling in the century or two following the flood. Of these two I personally prefer the former, but since I was not there my preference amounts to little more than private speculation. Either way, the presence of whole frozen animals with undigested food still in their mouths and stomachs cannot be explained by slow glaciation.

The book of Job probably provides the most information about Creation outside of the opening chapters of Genesis. Job contains several references to snow and three of the four references to ice in the entire bible. Consider this passage: “God thunders wondrously with his voice; he does great things that we cannot comprehend. For to the snow he says, 'Fall on the earth,' likewise to the downpour, his mighty downpour. He seals up the hand of every man, that all men whom he made may know it. Then the beasts go into their lairs, and remain in their dens. From its chamber comes the whirlwind, and cold from the scattering winds. By the breath of God ice is given, and the broad waters are frozen fast.” (Job 37:5-10, ESV) This last sentence in particular suggests Job and his friends knew about glaciers along with snow, rain, and cold winds.

Average global temperatures are known to vary. In the 10th and 11th centuries England produced wine rivaling the best vineyards of France. This rivalry led to war. During the same period Vikings settled the fertile and lush land in southern Greenland. The “little ice age” began about 1315 A.D. Within a generation almost the civilization of Greenland was decimated. Unable to grow crops and keep animals alive, survivors departed for the warmer European continent. England could no longer produce fine wine. The Thames river is said to have frozen over completely many times during the 14th and into the 15th centuries.

More recently, there is little doubt that average global temperature has risen slightly over the last few decades. There is a great deal of debate as to why. The popular notion it is largely man’s fault may not be correct. Many factors are precisely balanced to maintain the temperature of our planet. Cloud cover, particularly in the lower atmosphere, is the most significant single factor because clouds block and reflect so much heat. Recent observations have shown that cosmic radiation directly impacts cloud formation. When solar flare activity is high there is more solar wind. Solar wind reduces the amount of cosmic radiation reaching the lower atmosphere. It has been reliably shown that with sunspot activity there is lower cloud formation and higher average surface temperature. It is likely that the warm age of the 10th to 12th centuries saw higher average solar flare activity than the much cooler period of the 14th and 15th centuries.

16. Down the Drain

“But the mountain falls and crumbles away, and the rock is removed from its place; the waters wear away the stones; the torrents wash away the soil of the earth; so you destroy the hope of man.” Job 14:18-19

Erosion is a technical term. It essentially means Earth’s surface is wearing away. Erosion may occur by either a chemical or a mechanical process. Either way, small bits of soil and rock break off or dissolve and move down from high elevation to low elevation. Eroded material is carried away with wind and water currents. Eventually eroded material finds its way into the oceans. Erosion affects ocean chemistry.

The second law of thermodynamics predicts erosion. Neither the Creation nor Materialist model directly predicts erosion per se. The two models do make distinctly different predictions about the age of Earth and, by extrapolation, we can predict how erosion should affect our planet.

Evidence of erosion is all around us. Hard rain can cause mudslides and we often see muddy streams of water running from fields after a rain. The 1930’s dustbowl is an example of wind erosion. River deltas are an example of what happens to dust, dirt and rock eroded from higher elevations. Areas frequently flooded by overflowing rivers are often among the most fertile agricultural areas because the water carries along rich topsoil from places upstream. Ultimately a great deal of the eroded material finds its way into the oceans. Anyone who has seen a diver on television knows that silt builds up quickly on sunken ships or anything else on the sea floor.

High-tech modern equipment can very accurately measure the pace at which mountains are pushed up by tectonic plates pushing together. It is also possible to measure erosion of the same mountains. Today mountains are eroding faster than they are being pushed up. If Earth is only a few thousand years old, particularly if its highest mountains were formed during a recent flood, the present height of our great mountain ranges is not a problem. If Earth is billions of years old and if plate and erosion activity is little changed over vast ages, Earth’s mountains should be virtually flat.

Oceans are chemically rich. Chemicals carried to the oceans by erosion dissolve into the ocean water. A certain amount of any chemical element remains suspended in the water while excess amounts eventually separate out and sink to the bottom. We know approximately how much of each element is present in Earth’s soil. We can easily measure ocean water samples to find out how much of any given chemical element is present in the ocean.

If Earth and its oceans are a billion years old, there should be an equilibrium amount of every element suspended in ocean water even if the ocean started out as completely pure water. What we observe is anything but equilibrium amounts of nearly every element. Some chemical ratios limit Earth’s maximum age to a several million years while others limit maximum age to several thousand years. This means Earth could be younger than several thousand years, but could not be older.

17. Rock & Roll

“Tremble, O earth, before the Lord, Before the God of Jacob, Who turned the rock into a pool of water, The flint into a fountain of water.” Ps 114:7-8 (NASB)

Rocks come in three basic types: sedimentary, metamorphic, and igneous. Igneous rocks are produced through volcanic activity. Metamorphic rocks are produced by intense pressure. Sedimentary rock is essentially made by concretion.

Sedimentary rock is formed when water reacts chemically to cement particles of sediment. The specific type of sedimentary rock depends mostly on the chemistry of the raw particles. Thick sheets of fossil rich limestone, sandstone and dolomite form the bedrock under the topsoil of much of North America. For the moment let us put aside the question of how old any given part of the sedimentary rock layers might be. Instead, we will first ask whether the layers of sedimentary rock we observe were laid down quickly or slowly.

The Uniformitarian model states that sediment is laid down slowly, layer on layer, over vast ages. If we allow for periodic local flooding in a given area over millions of years, we would expect to see the effects of erosion on the top surfaces of sedimentary rock layers. The boundaries between the layers should be relatively smooth. There should be evidence of weathering with wind and water wear.

The Genesis flood model predicts a sudden movement of sediment in violent water. The effects should be widespread across large areas. The sediment layers should be of varying depths and composition. Layers would not have an opportunity to dry and harden before additional layers would be deposited. This in turn means we would not expect to find mostly smooth boundaries between layers. We would expect to find rough surfaces, ripples, and “fossilization” of whatever surface features a layer may have had when later layers were dumped on top.

Smooth layer breaks are almost never found in nature. Instead ripple-like breaks are often found between sedimentary rock layers. Rapid burial is the only reasonable explanation for detailed surface features like ripples and droplets in sedimentary rock layer boundaries. Most sedimentary rocks have vivid surface features where layers of rock interface. This sort of interface suggests a rapid depositing of layers by a flood of rushing sediment pouring in and swirling as currents shifted, ebbed, and flowed. The rock boundary evidence in nature fits the Genesis flood model far better than the Uniformitarian model.

Another problem for the Uniformitarian theory is the lack of observable natural processes at work today producing natural sedimentary rock similar what we find when we dig just a few feet down in much of the continental United States.

18. Fossil Fuel

“Behold, they are like stubble; the fire consumes them; they cannot deliver themselves from the power of the flame. No coal for warming oneself is this, no fire to sit before!” Is 47:14 (ESV)

Coal and oil are commonly called fossil fuels. Coal, like limestone, contains a great number of fossils, although plant fossils tend to dominate coal deposits. Coal is the product of a great mass of organic material being crushed until most of the hydrogen and oxygen (free or combined as liquid water) is pressed out. After the hydrogen and oxygen are gone organic material is almost entirely carbon, the principle element found in coal. Oil is chemically similar to coal, but in liquid form.

When organic material dies, it generally decays or is consumed by living things. It is extremely unusual for animals or plants to be buried in nature. The only time we observe any substantial natural burial of organic material is as a result of flood deposits or volcanic eruption.

The explosive eruption of Mount St. Helen provides an excellent example of ash burial of a large area. Near the eruption trees were blown over and a layer of ash and debris many inches thick covered the ground. A few miles away the ash coating was severe, but trees remained standing far above the surface. Farther out most plants survived. Two decades later trees and all of the normal flora are growing again above the ash. In the course of time it is possible that organic material buried by Mt. St. Helen will decay and under compression form a small amount of oil or coal. This was one of the most powerful volcanic explosions with one of the largest organic burials in recorded history. To create the vast oil and coal deposits on the planet it would take tens or hundreds of millions of such explosions. Even given 250 million years of lush plant life—a generous span of time even by evolutionary count—there is simply no way volcanism can account for the world’s supply of oil and coal. The only known alternative to burial by volcanism is burial by flood deposits.

Local flooding occurs periodically throughout the temperate and tropical zones of Earth. Even relatively minor floods display nature’s awesome power to rip soil, organic material, and anything else from one place and deposit those things elsewhere. Local floods are still limited in size and scope to specific regions. Flood prone regions like the Ohio River and Mississippi River valleys typically experience great floods once or twice per century. In 1937 a great flood submerged downtown Louisville, Kentucky. Even at its worst, with its many tributaries pouring out of their banks, the hills of New Albany, Indiana (which overlook Louisville) remained far above the flood waters. Tens of millions of years do not begin to offer enough time or the right type of sediment to cover the entire floor of the Ohio River valley with a thick layer of hard, fossil rich limestone. It seems extremely unlikely that a span of 250,000,000 years (since the start of the Cambrian period) would be enough time for the correct type of sediment to collect with intact submerged marine creatures becoming fossilized.

The combination of fossils within the cement-like limestone creates the most challenging puzzle for Evolutionists. Most of North America would have had to be under the sea. Almost the entire continent would have had experience sudden tumultuous deposition of sediment. The biblical flood model predicts exactly what we observe—fossil rich sedimentary deposits covering vast regions in great sheets. The biblical flood predicts variability in thickness and fossil content from place to place due to the violent nature of water movement. The rapid runoff of water as the flood subsided would likewise have created gulches where water running off would cut through thinner sediments. Thicker sediment would be left behind to dry and harden.

In time plant life would return. Some seeds, spores, bulbs, and so forth would be at or near the surface after the waters receded. From the soggy organic debris the plants sprang up, soon covering the ground. Over centuries compost resulting from the cycle of plant life along with periodic local floods created rich topsoil. The distribution and thickness of the topsoil over the thick limestone bedrock is much more consistent with a sudden, violent, flood large enough to cover the continent a few thousand years ago.

If great sheets of limestone, sandstone, and similar sedimentary rock deposits suggest one relatively recent great flood, the coal and oil deposits in North America and the world in general demand it. Unlike limestone, which contains a great deal of silicon, coal is mostly carbon. Like limestone, coal is often rich with fossils. In limestone the fossils we find tend to be from animals. In coal, the majority of fossils are from plants. Organic material is mostly carbon combined with water. It is generally believed that coal is created in nature when organic material is buried and crushed until most of the water and other elements leak out. The nearly pure organic compost eventually hardens into rock form. Oil is produced in essentially the same way, but remains liquid because less of the hydrogen and oxygen are able to escape.

As described earlier, plant life tends to remain on the surface of the ground when it dies. Some of it becomes compost, some is eaten, and some provide habitats for other new life. Without sudden and substantial burial, there is no known way for organic material to find its way far enough into the ground to become even fine coal particulate, let alone the great deposits mined today to create electricity for much of the United States. The only reasonable explanation for Earth’s great coal and oil supplies is the sudden burial of lush jungles with immense sediments under the force of a great, violent, crushing flood as is described in Genesis.

The Genesis flood would have provided an ample mechanism to create the coal beds and oil deposits found all around the world. It should also be noted that no process is being observed in nature today to create new coal or oil, even in the rare but active peat bogs of Scotland or tar pits in California. Genesis provides a much better explanation for coal and oil than any version of Uniformitarian or Evolutionary theory.

19. Fossilization

“He will be buried with a donkey's burial, Dragged off and thrown out beyond the gates of Jerusalem.” Jer 22:19 (NASB)

There are six main fossilization processes. These processes are observable and repeatable under laboratory conditions, if not in nature. Most require water or rapid burial in sediment or both. Almost all fossils present on earth today can easily be explained by a planetary flood but cannot be satisfactorily explained by supposing many small local catastrophes over millions of years.

Freezing is extremely rare in nature today, although numerous animals have been found frozen into fossils. They are preserved in part or whole, even with hair and flesh intact. Most have been found along the northern parts of Siberia and Alaska and include thousands of wooly mammoths, bear, rhinoceros, and other mammals. A few have even been found with food still in their mouths and undigested food in their stomachs. This indicates the animals were frozen suddenly and conditions were such that scavengers were unable to consume them. If an animal is trapped under an avalanche, for example, it would be protected from scavengers, but it would probably live long enough to swallow what was in its mouth. In many cases the places where they are found are on frozen planes. This makes burial by a normal avalanche extremely unlikely.

Most scientists agree that the polar regions were once much warmer than they are today. Frozen tropical animals makes it clear that the temperature change was extreme and sudden. Either the atmosphere changed or the landmass suddenly moved to a cold place, or both. Whichever is the case, the event impacted a vast region seemingly simultaneously. This is suggested by the fact that there is no indication that once frozen these animals were ever thawed and refrozen. If that happened they would have rotted or been picked clean by scavengers. Many of these animals have been found with almost no deterioration at all.

Extremely rapid freezing of a tropical area seems highly unlikely in the uniformitarian model if for no other reason than large scale catastrophes of any kind are denied. Some people theorize that atmospheric debris from an asteroid wiped out most of the dinosaurs and caused an ice age. There are several difficulties with this theory. With regard to frozen remains of tropical animals in polar regions, It seems extremely unlikely that even large amounts of dirt in the atmosphere would have cause the surface to cool fast enough in such a vast area to account for the abundance of frozen remains.

Leaving aside human theories, the biblical account provides an historical record that offers much more plausible explanations for the evidence at hand. One scientific theory based on the biblical account is that the animals were alive before the flood and were frozen early in the flood. Water vapor in the atmosphere may have caused a more uniform temperature around the planet. As the atmosphere suddenly released great amounts of water, polar regions experienced rapid freezing. Northern Alaska and Siberia could have experienced a temperature drop of 100°F or more in a matter of hours. Another variation on this theory is that when fountains of the deep broken open, tectonic plates moved whole continents from tropical to polar regions in a few days or possibly hours.

Fossilized hard animal parts (bones and shells) are most common type of fossil. Usually when an animal dies its soft parts rot or get consumed by scavengers and the bones disintegrate over time. In some cases bones get buried in sediment. Bones get preserved as fossils when the sediment hardens into rock before the bones have a chance to disintegrate. Most limestone and sandstone fossils are of this type. The most likely cause of this type of fossilization is a flood.

The numbers and densities of such deposits around the world testify to massive sudden flooding. The uniformitarian model would require hundreds if not thousands of major localized floods trapping thousands of organisms, large and small. The flood of Noah, however, accounts for all such fossils.

Castings are similar to fossilized hard parts except that none of the original organism remains. Sediments cover the animal and harden. The animal inside dissolves. Water seeping into the cavity carries minerals in and organic waste out. The casting is eventually filled and formed. The result is a replica in part or whole of the original animal. The cast must be formed quickly with some sort of cementing process. Burial by flood debris is much more common than volcanic burial, yet bodies found in Pompeii are an excellent example of natural castings. The volcanic rock covered and quickly cooled to form casts around the bodies. The bodies themselves eventually rotted and rainwater filled in the casting with sediment to form fossil castings.

The most beautiful and exotic fossils are those of soft animals. Particularly unique are jellyfish fossils, although any fossil of soft marine life is amazing. Fish are notoriously carnivorous. Dead soft marine parts almost never go uneaten by sea scavengers. Jellyfish are entirely soft, made mostly of water. Short of a violent flood of biblical proportions to carry and churn vast amounts of sediment there is no logical explanation for sudden burial of ocean creatures like jellyfish.

Petrifaction is another fossilization process similar to castings. The filling material is typically carried into the casting by underground water carrying minerals. The petrified forests of Yellowstone Park and in Arizona are well known examples of this type of fossilization. As with castings, petrifaction requires very rapid burial and cementing of the mold around the original plant or animal life followed by a period of minerals being carried by water into the void left by the decay of the original organism. The vast petrified forests discovered in these places require a very rapid and large-scale hydraulic (flood) event to bury the quantity of life found there.

Fossilized tracks are the next kind of fossil. Tracks of all sorts of animal life, including humans, become fossils when the soft surface is cemented by powerful hydraulic force then gets covered by softer sediment. The tracks harden and can later be uncovered when the softer sediment is removed. Tracks of all sorts of creatures have been found in fossil beds around the world.

Fossils found in coal are the result of a different fossilization process called carbonization. In this process hydrogen and oxygen largely disappear leaving mostly carbon. Coal has been found in nearly every region of Earth including Antarctica. Coal is believed to be the end product of metamorphism of tremendous quantities of plant remains. Coal seams vary from a few inches to several feet of depth and may run in alternating layers with other sedimentary rock such as limestone. The density of the coal means either plants morphed into coal over a vast period or there was a vast amount of vegetation buried together suddenly. Alternating layers are explained in the uniformitarian model by saying an area alternated between forest and arid land over vast periods. The catastrophic Biblical model explains the layers as the result of shifting currents pushing and pressing accumulations of flood debris into layers buried rapidly. Although we have various peat bogs and the La Brea tar pits with us today, none of these demonstrate examples of coal formation or fossilization by carbonization today.

Except for freezing, all of the other fossilization methods require burial by flood or volcanic eruption. Castings, petrifaction and tracks specifically require water as part of the process. Carbonization requires water to be drawn out of organic material under great pressure. Uniformitarianism offers repeating cycles of local flooding as the explanation. Repeated limited locals floods fail to explain the density and distribution of fossils, sedimentary rock deposits, coal seams, and the worlds vast oil and natural gas reservoirs. Only the biblical flood offers a succinct single explanation for all of the fossil remains, limestone, coal and oil with its vast and diverse distribution.

Most fossilization methods require rapid burial. Cementing action takes very little time. The existence of fossils does not, in and of itself, require vast time. Only the theory of Evolution combined with geological Uniformitarianism requires vast time.

21. Chemistry & Physics

“As you saw the iron mixed with soft clay, so they will mix with one another in marriage, but they will not hold together, just as iron does not mix with clay.”—Daniel 2:43 (ESV)

Chemistry is a broad term used to describe an array of sciences concerned with observing and describing characteristics and behavior of atoms and molecules. Organic chemistry, or biochemistry, deals with chemical activity in living things. Inorganic chemistry deals with chemical activity among non-living things.

Physics is a general term describing a range of sciences concerned with way things interact mechanically, particularly with regard to energy and forces. Quantum physics is concerned with sub-atomic particles. Classical physics is concerned with stuff bigger than the atom.

Chemistry is most closely related to classical physics because both deal with things at least as large as whole atoms. This means chemistry and classical physics share a common set of rules. For example, classical physics and chemistry both recognize a physical law which states that two material things cannot occupy the same space at the same time. In the realm of quantum physics this law is demonstrably untrue. The point of this distinction is to show that our mindset about reality is limited by the scope of our frame of reference. In other words, what we believe to be true is limited by our experiences. A chemist would typically ignore quantum physical laws that conflict with classical physical laws because from his viewpoint they do not apply. They simply are not part of his reality. In fact, quantum physics laws which conflict with chemistry must be ignored. The chemist is like the materialist who must deny non-material reality. Whether the non-material reality is true or not, the conflicts present problems that simply have to be denied or ignored.

Material reality is composed of matter and energy. Matter is composed of atoms in various chemical arrangements. A molecule is the smallest grouping of atoms to maintain the chemical structure of a whole substance. For example, rust is composed of molecules of iron and oxygen atoms. The smallest amount of rust that is still rust is a molecule. A molecule can be as simple as a single atom or it can be comprised of a large number of atoms organized in a very specific three-dimensional structure. Adding or removing even a single atom will change the chemical characteristics of the molecule making it a different substance.

A chemical element is a substance composed of only one kind of atom. For example, pure oxygen is composes of only oxygen atoms. Pure carbon is composed of pure carbon. Pure gold contains nothing but gold atoms. Atoms are composed of protons, neutrons, and electrons. An atom is identified chemically by the number of protons in its nucleus. This is because the number of protons in the nucleus determines chemical behavior of the atom. The chemical behavior of individual atoms determines how the atoms combine into molecules. When atoms join together to form a molecule, it is the specific combination of atoms which determines the chemical behavior of the substance.

Most molecules in non-living things are relatively simple compared with typical molecules in living things. This is exactly what the Creation model expects to find. Earth began formless and void, but order was introduced and increased over the course of the Creation week. Man was formed from the dust, thus the simple was used as the basis for construction of the complex. It stands to reason that even at the molecular level inorganic substances would generally be far less complex than living things.

The Materialist model supposes life formed through random natural chance. According to this model, simple became complex without supernatural direction. If we put aside for a moment the problem of entropy working against any natural increase in order or information embedded in nature, a much larger logic problem exists. Evolution supposes small and gradual changes over time. This alone is not a problem. Evolution further supposes increases in order through the process of natural selection working on beneficial mutation. This supposed process is not observed in nature, nor do we find the nearly infinite transitional stages predicted by the Evolution model.

As it relates to chemistry generally, there should be a spectrum of quasi-organic molecules in nature. If life rose through purely natural means, we should be able to find the building blocks of life mixed with non-organic substances. Interestingly, there seems to be a substantial and profound difference between simple inorganic chemistry and complex organic chemistry. Just as the gap here presents a problem for Materialist models, the gap fits perfectly with the Creation model. When God breathed life into the simple inorganic substances to form living substances, those substances were changed suddenly and completely from simple to complex. The transitional substances anticipated by the Materialist simply do not exist.

20. The Fossil Record

“I tell you, if these become silent, the stones will cry out!” Lk 19:40 (NASB)

Charles Darwin and those of similar materialistic belief seek to involve the fossil record in their philosophical faith. Upon close examination of the fossil record, even if we ignore that the flood described by Genesis is the most likely source, the fossils themselves testify to the accuracy of the Creation account while crying out the failure of Evolution as viable theory.

Darwinian theory supposes gradual change over time. Darwin expected to find an almost limitless number of transitional stages between similar but distinct animals or plants. Hoping to find evidence in support of this idea, he developed his now famous “tree of life” sketches. In Origin of Species he acknowledged some of the potential flaws in his theory including the possibility that systematic gaps in the fossil record might not get filled in.

There are systematic gaps between kinds in the fossil record just as there are between creatures living today. The same gaps exist in the fossil record as exist today. There are many breeds of horses, for example, but no physical evidence of any transitional creature between horses and donkeys, llamas, or camels. Evolutionists have given up on demanding humans descended from apes. Instead, they now contend apes and humans share a common yet missing ancestor. There are glaring gaps, for example, between birds and reptiles with no viable evidence of a transitional animal. There are peculiarities in nature, like the duck billed platypus, yet there remains a huge gap between this animal and birds other animals that appear more similar.

There is no good way to determine the age of a fossil. We know fossils can and do form relatively quickly. The question of dating is not the time it takes to make a fossil. Since Evolution requires upward development of complexity over a long period of time, it is assumed that the fossils of the oldest creatures are buried deepest. It is next assumed that certain types of animal “appeared” at certain key points in the evolutionary process. Fossils of these key animals, called index fossils, then serve as relative age markers. The time required for evolutionary development is then estimated. From this Evolutionists put together a framework to explain the development of the diversity of life.

Taxonomy is the branch of science that deals with classifying life. For example, taxonomy is used to distinguish plants from animals, mammals from fish, and tigers from horses. The closer two different species are, the more detailed the descriptions must be to identify one organism from another. Taxonomy relies on differences rather than similarities to classify organisms. The principles of taxonomy are just as useful in distinguishing fossils.

Darwin was looking for a continuum of progressive links between kinds. Paradoxically he used taxonomy to build his tree of life. In a similar paradox, taxonomy is used to identify index fossils. Taxonomy is possible precisely because the continuum Darwin predicted does not exist. There are systematic gaps between unique kinds of organisms. The intermediary stages required do not exist in the fossils or in contemporary living nature.

The sheer quantity of fossils found around the world is astounding. Distribution also tells us a great deal. Certain types of fossils tend to be clustered together in certain geographical areas. For example, large numbers of dinosaur fossils are often found relatively close together. This is often accounted for by saying the animals traveled together in herds in a relatively small area. It is far more likely that such great animals grazed vast areas. Since fossilization generally requires a flood (or in some cases volcanic activity), it seems more likely that herds were washed together into common graves by the power of a some water catastrophe. Geologists and paleontologists who believe in Evolution will accept local or regional flooding and in so doing they construct a framework of small-scale catastrophes over time. Creationists simply place it in the context of a single planetary flood.

The Grand Canyon is a spectacular gulch lined with layers of various kinds of rock and amazing fossils. There is no disagreement that running water cut out the Grand Canyon. Uniformitarianism says the Colorado River cut the canyon over millions of years. The Biblical model of a worldwide flood catastrophe paints a very different and much faster picture. In the Genesis flood model, tectonic plate motion resulted in compression which in turn resulted in the rise of great mountain ranges including the Rocky Mountains. In the latter stages of the biblical flood, the water receded into the ocean basins. Thick layers of sediment in the Northern Arizona region were still saturated and soft when the Rocky Mountains rose and the water began draining into the collapsed oceanic basins. Most of the erosion resulting in the formation of the Grand Canyon took place in a matter of a few months of constant, powerful, water runoff.

The theory of one great catastrophe (as opposed to many successive small catastrophes) is further supported by geological peculiarities like polystrata fossilized trees. There are excellent examples of petrified trees passing through multiple layers of rock strata in the Grand Canyon. The obvious implication is that the layers were not laid down (or cut out) over a long period of flood cycles, but rather by a single event.

Perhaps the matter could be settled if we had a good way to tell how old the rock and its fossils actually are. The two main dating methods used to estimate fossil age are by using index fossils and radiometric dating. Radiometric dating is unreliable, inconsistent, and involves too many assumptions. Evolutionary geologists generally reject radiometric dating except where the results approximate what is expected using the index fossil method. Unfortunately neither the arbitrary index fossil method nor the radiographic method can give us any real, useful, information about fossil ages.

22. Quantum Physics

“And God said, ‘Let there be light.’ And there was light.”—Gen 1:3 (KJV)

Einstein figured out that mass and energy are related. A certain amount of mass has a certain amount of energy. It is possible to convert mass to energy or vise-versa. Sub-atomic particles exist with specific amounts of energy. For example, if an electron moves from one shell to another, it must either gain or lose an exact amount of energy or cannot make the change. If a proton is converted to a neutron or vice-versa, the conversion requires or gives off a very specific amount of energy. For matter to organize at all requires energy conversions with incredibly precise standards. The study of mass and energy interactions at this level is often called quantum physics.

An atom is the smallest thing to have a certain chemical property, but atoms are themselves made up of three basic components—protons and neutrons in the nucleus and electrons orbiting in “shells” in a cloud around the nucleus. Protons have a positive charge and determine the chemical element. Electrons have a negative charge and manage the interactions between atoms. Protons and neutrons are roughly the same size (10-15m), but an electron is only about 10-18m. Neutrons determine the isotope and overall stability of the nucleus. Neutrons have no net electrical charge force.

Neutrons and protons are made of even smaller particles called quarks. It takes three quarks to make a proton or neutron. Up quarks carry a +2/3 charge. Down quarks carry a –1/3 charge. Two up quarks and a down quark make a proton with a net +1 charge. One up quark and two down quarks make a neutron with a net charge of zero. An up or down quark can exist in one of three sizes, although only one size is stable in nature. Each type and size has an opposite polarity version. The opposite polarity version quarks are called “anti” version. From this we get the term “anti-matter.” When a normal (matter) quark comes into close contact with an opposite polarity (anti-matter) version of itself, the two disintegrate. When this happens, a fixed (quantum) amount of energy is released. Under certain conditions a quantum energy packet can spontaneous convert to matter and anti-matter quarks in a process called a “quantum fluctuation.” Some scientists believe quantum fluctuations account for the existence of matter in the universe. Although this theory has some support in the scientific community, the lack of anti-matter observed in nature combined with the instability and thus short life span of the unstable quantum fluctuation products makes it a very unlikely cause for the existence of ordinary matter.

The next type of sub-atomic particle is the lepton. An electron is a common lepton. Just like there are three sizes of quark with anti versions of each, leptons may also exist in three sizes with anti versions of each. An anti lepton is commonly called a positron. Positrons are emitted during certain kinds of radioactive decay. Like quarks and anti-quarks, when an electron and positron come into contact they disintegrate and emit a quantum energy packet.

Neutrinos have very low mass and no measurable charge. Neutrinos are released by various nuclear reactions although neutrinos have very little interaction with other matter.

Light is made up of photons. Photons exhibit characteristics of both mass and energy. Essentially, a photon is a tiny individual packet of energy. Each photon has a certain amount of energy. Photons move in waves. The waves have a certain length, hence the term wavelength. The shorter the wavelength, the higher the frequency. For example, some photons move in the visible frequency range while other photons with a different energy level move in the microwave or x-ray range. Photons may be absorbed or emitted in nuclear processes.

Atoms are mostly just space, much like our solar system. Quarks and leptons (electrons) are about 10-18 m across. A proton or neutron which is made up of 3 quarks is about 10-15 m across, or about 1000 times the size of an individual quark. The nucleus of a typical atom as heavy as carbon is about 10-14 m across or about 10 times the size of an individual neutron or proton. The size of the whole atom with its electron cloud is about 10-10 m across, or about 10,000 times the size of the nucleus and 100 million times the size of a single electron.

Free protons tend to repel one another. Atoms are held together by something called nuclear binding force. This force is related to the mass of the nucleus. Neutrons and protons both contribute to the binding force. Binding force must overcome the repulsive electrical force of the protons in order to hold the atom together. Binding force is extremely weak until the protons and neutrons are extremely close together. The balance of these forces make it possible for matter to exist as unique and stable atoms. The precise quality of these forces is not predicted by the Materialist model. The precision of design at the subatomic level is predicted by the Creation model which relies on the presence of an intelligent designer.

In the realm of classical physics, 1+1=2 is always true. In the realm of nuclear physics, the math is not always so clean. For example, if one proton has a weight of one amu (atomic mass unit), you would think that two protons would have a combined weight of 2 amu whether they were in the same atom or not. This is not true. When two hydrogen atoms (1 proton each) fuse together to form a helium atom (2 protons in one nucleus), the combined mass is slightly less than 2 amu. The difference is given off as energy. The process of combining two atoms to form a larger composite atom is called fusion. The sun in an excellent example of a massive fusion engine giving off a constant stream of heat and light energy (photons). Fusion reactions require input of energy to cause the initial fusing event. As atoms become bigger, they begin to require more energy to fuse. By the time you get up the atomic size of iron, it begins to take more energy to fuse than is given off by the fusion reaction. There is no known process in nature capable of creating any element heavier than iron.

Fission is the opposite of fusion. Fission occurs when a heavy atom breaks apart into two (or more) smaller atoms. Nuclear power generating plants and nuclear warheads both depend on the physics of fission. In this case, the sum of the mass of the whole atom is more than the sum of the mass of the parts given off. The difference is, once again, heat and light energy. Large atoms give off more energy from fission than they require in order to initiate fission. Atoms smaller than iron will require more energy in to cause fission than can be released from fission. Only certain elements of specific isotopes are prone to fission. Uranium and Plutonium are among the most efficient fission fuels and then only when the element is purified (enriched) to certain isotopes.

The existence of heavy elements without a known natural cause is amazing. The existence of distinct and stable fusion energy sources (stars) is amazing. The fact that unstable (radioactive) heavy elements that exist in nature have not all decayed is amazing. Materialism supposes that some heavy atoms are produced when stars go supernova. The debris then can reform into new solar systems. The Creation model also supposes heavy elements were produced in the first day as the newborn matter began collapsing under the weight of gravity—until God began to intervene by spreading space and forming distinct celestial bodies.

Fusion and fission are not the only known nuclear reaction processes. Photons and neutrons are known to either be absorbed or released as part of various types of reactions. Two of the more common reactions are alpha and beta decay. Radium dial watches, popular in the early 20th century, emitted light as part of the alpha decay process. Nitrogen in the atmosphere is converted to carbon when activated by cosmic radiation through β+ decay. The carbon eventually converts back to nitrogen through the reverse β– decay process. Beta decay is probably best known for its role in Carbon-14 dating.

While not directly relevant to the question of model comparisons, there are some striking “coincidental” similarities between nuclear relationships and biblical relationships. The bible teaches there is God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. Three parts make one whole, just as three quarks make a baryon (proton or neutron) or one might say the proton, neutron and electron making up the whole atom represent the components of God. There is matter and anti-matter, but they cannot coexist, at least not for very long. There is good and evil, but ultimately they cannot coexist. Good and evil battle, but the bible promises that good will ultimately win. Matter and anti-matter battle, but the universe is made of mostly matter so when anti-matter appears, it cannot exist for long and cannot eliminate enough normal matter to have any significant effect.

God said He created everything. Everything is made up of the fundamental stuff of atoms. Atoms are made up of the same stuff, but they combine in nearly infinite potential combinations to make up all the variety of everything we know. We are made of the same basic stuff, yet we are each unique.

Neutrons and protons are in the nucleus; electrons are in a cloud. Father and son are in heaven, yet the Holy Spirit interacts with man. The bible even teaches that the Holy Spirit appeared in the form of a cloud (Ex 13:21, 1 Ki 8:10-11, Ez 10:4, Mt 17:5). Electrons allow atoms to interact with one another. Just as atoms combine to form molecules that form life, so too the Holy Spirit allows people to join in congregations to form the whole Church, the living bride of Christ. The Holy Spirit goes where it will yet changes lives by joining us with God in an inexplicable way. Twelve tribes founded Israel. Twelve apostles founded the church. Carbon 12 is said to be the foundation of life.

23. Inorganic Radioactive Dating

“As I looked, thrones were placed, and the Ancient of Days took his seat; his clothing was white as snow, and the hair of his head like pure wool; his throne was fiery flames; its wheels were burning fire.” Dan 7:9 (ESV)

Radioactive dating methods provide a basis for some of the most convincing proofs for the Materialist belief that the earth is billions of years old and that life is at least millions of years old. There are several methods. Each method has its own virtues and liabilities. The applicability, accuracy and usefulness of each method deserve scrutiny. The question at hand is whether radioactive dating methods actually support an earth age far beyond what the biblical record suggests.

The Carbon-14 (C14) dating method is useful for dating organic material. Uranium decay is used to date crystal. Rubidium/Strontium decay is generally used to date igneous and metamorphic rock. Potassium/Argon decay is used to measure ages of the “oldest” rocks. The precise methods of decay vary, but the principle for determining age is generally the same. The amounts of parent and daughter isotopes in a sample are measured. The present ratio is compared to the assumed original ratio. The rate of decay is assumed to be relatively constant over time. Once the decay rate is known, the time required to get from original ratio to present ratio is easy to calculate. The assumed original ratio, stability of the decay rate, and the disregard for other factors affecting ratios over time reveal that conventional radioactive dating methods are highly questionable.

Radioactive decay rate is a logarithmic function of time commonly called half-life. Half-life is assumed to be constant and generally unaffected by heat, pressure, magnetic or electric fields, local chemistry or other environmental factors. The initial nuclide (proton and neutron) quantities and relative ratios must be assumed. These assumptions, particularly the notion you can know with any degree of certainly the original nuclide ration, are very bold indeed regardless of your beliefs about the past.

Let us first consider Uranium decay in crystals. Uranium and its various daughter products are frequently found as impurities in crystal zirconium (ZrSiO4), also called zircons. U238 undergoes several stages of decay to reach stable Pb206. U235 also undergoes stages of decay to reach stable Pb207. Conventional uranium decay dating techniques will typically suggest a very high age, usually on the order of a billion years or more.

As uranium breaks down it also produces helium atoms. Zircons tend to capture uranium atoms and reject lead. Helium produced during normal alpha decay will leak out of the zirconium crystal over time. The rate of helium leakage depends primarily on temperature. The higher the temperature, the greater the leakage. Temperature increases with depth. Helium leakage can be measured in core samples from various depths down as far as a few miles below the surface. By measuring the amount of remaining helium in samples at specific depth intervals, and knowing temperature at each interval, known leak rate with temperature establishes the activity level and time. Actual helium measurements taken from core samples submitted to independent labs for blind testing revealed that the Earth’s age is roughly 6000 years (±2000 years). [RATE Conference: predicted in 2000, measured in 2001]

The obvious discrepancy between U-PB dating and helium leakage dating in the same samples requires us to look for some way to reconcile. The possibly flawed assumptions with U-PB decay have already been described, so the potential flaws with helium leakage must be considered. Could the temperature have been lower in the past? To fit the billion year model, the temperature at 3 miles below the surface would have to have been somewhere below –40C at the time of formation. Temperature now is about 277C and the Materialist model suggests the temperature would have been higher in the past. Could there be extraneous helium in the samples? Helium diffusion results in less helium, not more. Helium does not diffuse from surrounding biotite into zircons and the average helium content in surrounding biotite is 1/200 that of helium in zircons. Another potential objection is pressure. Pressure at 3 miles down is 1000 atmospheres. The tests were performed in a vacuum. Evolutionary scientists performing the tests did not consider pressure to be a factor due to the hardness of the zircon crystals. Pressure was factored into measurements of mica and biotite from the core samples. The only other known viable argument is that leakage is increased by additional crystal damage due to radioactive decay. Visible crystal damage does not indicate any substantial additional leakage can be caused by subsequent decay events and in no case could it increase the age by more than a factor of two. Helium leakage data firmly supports the validity of a young earth and casts doubt on the widely accepted yet fatally flawed conventional U-PB old earth age measurements.

In addition to alpha and beta decay, various uranium isotopes will also spontaneously decay by fission. With naturally occurring uranium, the half-life is on the order of millions of years. When this occurs, the daughter products will shoot out in opposite directions leaving distinct radiohalo tracks. Daughter products along with size and color of tracks indicate exactly what the original parent element and isotope were. Various rock samples have plentiful fission tracks useful for measuring rock age. Although ages vary from a few million to several hundred million years, the first and most obvious conclusion is that abundant nuclear decay occurred during the formation of the rock strata.

Polonium is another radioactive element which leaves distinct radiohalos when it decays. Polonium is produced as part of the U-Pb alpha decay chain. Polonium-210 (Po210) has a half-life of 138 days. Polonium is easy carried away by hot fluids in the rocks. Rock samples taken at various locations show uranium and polonium halos side by side. This means the halos must have formed at about the same time. This in turn means that about 100 million years worth of uranium decay must have taken place very quickly to produce the amount of polonium indicated. The implication is that uranium decay rates must have been much higher at some point in the past.

In addition to measuring U-Pb decay to date rock, other techniques include measuring K40 to Ar40 decay, Rb87 to Sr87, and Sm147 to Nd147. Geologists do not normally use multiple measurement methods on the same sample. In a blind test, samples from five sites were sent to five different independent high quality labs. Each lab tested its sample using at least three of the methods. In every case there was substantial variation in apparent age depending on method. The results indicate that alpha decay methods indicate lower ages than beta decay methods. Also, heavier element decay methods indicate higher ages than lighter element decay methods. Finally, higher present half-life yielded higher apparent age. These results were consistent and well beyond the margin of error. If the half-life “clocks” all ran at the same rate, they should yield the same age results. The fact they do not indicates decay rates in the past were proportionally faster for heavier and longer half-life elements. This proves the most basic assumption of traditional radioactive dating, consistency of decay rates in the past, is a false assumption.

Another direct contradiction between theory and observation can be found in the age measurements of rock formed in recent Hawaiian lava flows. Underwater lava flows known to have formed and solidified less than two decades ago indicate a U-Pb age in excess of a million years.

Based on the inconsistencies and open assumptions of conventional radioactive dating methods, we now know these methods are not reliable indicators of true age. The mystery of radiohalos and inconsistent decay rate clocks strongly argue for accelerated decay rates in the past. Helium leakage tests provide results consistent with the biblical model without the open assumptions of parent/daughter ratios and other fallacies of radioactive dating methods. The conclusion is that the radioactive dating evidence fails to support any specific old age for the earth and does not actually require an old age for the earth, meanwhile helium leakage data strongly supports an earth age of just a few thousand years.

24. Organic Radioactive Dating

“The hand of the LORD was upon me, and He brought me out by the Spirit of the LORD and set me down in the middle of the valley; and it was full of bones.He caused me to pass among them round about, and behold, there were very many on the surface of the valley; and lo, they were very dry.” Ez 37:1-2 (NASB)

Radiocarbon (C14) dating is based on the same basic principle of measuring a parent/daughter ratio and using the half-life to calculate total age. Unlike methods discussed in the previous chapter, C14 dating is useful for measuring the age of organic material. C14 dating has been used to date cloth, parchment, and other organic remains of otherwise known age with relatively good accuracy. This is possible because of how C14 is produced in nature and stored in organic remains. Like other methods discussed in the previous chapter, there are serious problems with C14 dating under various circumstances.

C14 is produced when cosmic rays interact with free nitrogen in the atmosphere. Photons with exactly the right quantum energy cause β+ decay of free nitrogen (N14) to C14. In this type of decay, energy added by the cosmic ray to the nucleus of an N14 atom causes a proton to convert to a neutron. The resulting C14 atom has too many neutrons for long term stability. Instability will cause the extra neutron to revert back to a proton (β– decay) and the excess quantum energy is given up as a photon. On average, it takes about 5730 years for half of a given sample of C14 to decay back to N14.

C14 in the atmosphere bonds with free O2 molecules in exactly the same way C12 atoms combine chemically with O2 in our lungs to form CO2 molecules. Through photosynthesis, CO2 gets absorbed into plants. Animals and people then consume plants. C14 absorbed through the digestive process is then distributed through the body. It tends to build up in solid parts like bones and teeth which may remain long after an animal dies. This is why C14 dating is so widely used for determining approximate age for organic materials, including certain types of fossils.

The first and worst variable is the assumed initial C14 density in the atmosphere. C14 is not at equilibrium as it should be if the atmosphere has existed relatively unchanged for at least a million years. Biological variables include the rate of absorption in various plants, and the diet of the animal. Samples from various tree rings of very old trees are used in an attempt to correct for these variables. C14 measurements assume no carbon exchange between the organic sample and its surroundings.

C14 dating is limited by the resolution of test equipment. With our best spectrometers we can resolve to a small enough ratio of C14 to calculate a maximum age of about 60,000 to 100,000 years. After 100,000 years there should be no measurable C14 left in any given sample. After 1 million years there should be no real C14 left in any given sample.

C14 has been measured in Precambrian diamonds and in coal seams buried below “old” rock strata assumed to be millions of years old. Conventional wisdom is that diamonds were formed deep inside the earth more than one billion years ago. There is no known process by which diamonds mined from deep below ground could have C14 atoms. Regardless of how it got there, the presence of measurable C14 in diamonds implies an upper limit to the age of the earth of thousands of years rather than billions.

In addition to finding C14 in carbon rich yet supposedly very old diamonds and coal, it also found in fossil remains. Measurable C14 has been found in every fossil containing any original organic matter that was ever tested. In an effort to ignore this problem, samples believed to be more than about 50,000 years old are usually considered to be contaminated when C14 is found. Another common solution is to simply subtract environmental background C14 radiation to mask the presence of C14 in samples. In other words, it is common practice to fudge results to intentionally ignore the presence of C14 in samples believed to be too old to contain C14.

Ten coal samples provided by the US Department taken from ten different sites from different geological ages were tested at Pennsylvania State University for C14 content. Interestingly, all of the coal samples returned a similar age (average 49,600 years). The similarity of age results suggest a single hydraulic catastrophe in which the organic coal source was suddenly and universally buried. A universal planetary flood is widely denied by Materialists, yet C14 in the coal testifies to a singular event in the past like Noah’s flood described in scripture.

Calculated C14 ages of 50,000 years do not represent any real problem for young earth creationists. The reason is because the calculation is based on the assumption that the atmosphere contains an equilibrium amount of C14 and that no catastrophic climate or atmospheric changes have taken place in recent history. The Creation model includes a catastrophic atmospheric event, Noah’s Flood, less than 5000 years ago. There is no way to know with certainty how much C14 may have been in the atmosphere prior to the biblical flood, but based on the fact that atmospheric C14 today is well below equilibrium it is reasonable to assume the value must have been lower than today. It is also possible that the atmosphere contained substantially more water vapor prior to the flood. This would have further attenuated the production of C14 prior to the flood. Less atmospheric C14 prior to the flood would cause calculated ages to appear much higher than they actually are. In other words, the apparent 50,000 year age of coal could easily be 10 times greater than the real age. Not only does C14 in coal suggest a planetary flood, but when reasonable assumptions based on the biblical flood are figured in, coal age is easily placed in the range of the biblical flood.

25. Life from Non-Life

“Before I formed you in the womb I knew you; Before you were born I sanctified you; I ordained you a prophet to the nations.”—Jer 1:5 (NKJV)

Darwin’s Origin of Species proposes natural selection as the mechanism by which simple organisms became increasingly complex, yet he never made a direct claim as to how the first simple organisms came about. Most evolutionists are quick to claim that Darwin’s Theory of Evolution does not claim to explain how life actually began. The question of how the first simple living cell formed requires an answer. The Materialist answer is called abiogenesis—life from non-life through some yet to be identified purely natural process. Non-materialist answers vary from agnostic Intelligent Design to literal biblical Creation.

Abiogenesis is the branch of evolutionary research that seeks to understand and explain how life arose from non-life. This endeavor assumes the materialistic view that life arose through undirected (chance) natural chemical activity. The picture most people have in mind is of a lightening bolt striking some primordial soup. The result is the perfect combination of atoms to form amino acids, the most basic chemical building blocks. Subsequent energy input from heat or electricity supposedly caused these amino acids to bond correctly to form proteins and, somewhere on the heel of this magnificently simple idea, Evolution takes over to drive the ever increasing complexity of life. A number of significant problems make the popular notion of life arising from some ancient soup extremely unlikely.

Life’s most basic chemical components require an environment where the chemicals are free to react. The presence of water in any primordial soup would prevent amino acids and nucleotides from combining. A chemical principle known as the Law of Mass Action says that reactions proceed from highest to lowest concentration. Water forms as a byproduct of amino acid polymerization. The Law of Mass Action means that any process that produces water cannot be performed in the presence of water.

If we assume the soup was completely water-free, containing only free amino acids and nucleotides, the variable reaction rates would require a highly precise timing of reactions for any meaningful combinations to take place to produce a higher functioning polymer. Even the simplest polymeric sequences in our DNA require a degree of precision virtually impossible to be the product of random chance. In addition to the difficulty of random timing of reactions, the location of each reaction matters. Once two amino acids join they form a chain. When the additional acids react, they may react at either end of the chain. A four-part chain would require not only the correct amino acids combining, but combining at the right ends of the chain. With each new link in the chain comes a 50/50 chance of it being added at the wrong end. This means the odds of an incorrect chain combination double with each additional amino acid. Proteins contain hundreds of amino acids linked in a chain, activated in the right sequence and at the right rate. Even if only the right raw amino acids are present in the right relative proportions, the odds of forming an original protein are so slight as to be virtually impossible.

Nucleotides are necessary for DNA and RNA. They are formed by the reactions involving sugars known as reducing sugars. Amino acids are required to form proteins. Reducing sugars and amino acids would be mutually exclusive in a primordial soup because they instantly react with each other. Both components are removed from the mixture and the resulting chemical is useless for the formation of nucleotides or proteins.

Assuming all of the problems above are somehow overcome, the necessary amino acid and sugar molecules must have exactly the correct three-dimensional shape to combine properly. This three-dimensional property of a molecule is called chirality. Chirality can be thought of as handedness. To join correctly, every amino acid of every protein must be left-handed while every nucleotide must be right-handed. If any of the naturally occurring proteins or sugars are handed wrong, the original gene cannot form.

The only way to form a useful polymer sequence is to carefully control the process under very specific laboratory conditions. Abiogenesis—the logical extension of Darwin’s theory—assumes random natural processes formed life. Without conditions and contents being directed by an intelligent designer, formation of original DNA or RNA in a lab is simply impossible. [Dr. Charles McCombs, Acts & Facts 2/09]

Let us put some statistical mathematics in our imaginary primordial soup to understand just how absurd is the possibility of accidental life. The rate of complexity increases exponentially as the number of components increases in a machine. The odds of four unique parts combining in an exact order is 1 in 24; five parts = 1 in 120. If you mix 100 unique parts in a box then pull them out randomly, the odds of doing so in an exact order is about 1 in 10158. If all 1080 atoms in the universe were scrambled twice per second for 30 billion years (1018 seconds), the odds of a 100 atom chain forming in the right order are only 1 in 1042. The most basic living protein has far more than 100 amino acids, each consisting of several atoms. This math does not even factor in the problems of three dimensional shape requirements. The odds of life from non-life are infinitesimal. It seems ridiculous to suggest the building blocks of life formed and combined originally by accident.

Odds have not stopped hopeful evolutionists in their daunting task to demonstrate how life might have arose from non-life. The principles of abiogenesis were most famously put to the test in the 1953 experiment was performed by Stanley Miller with the help of Harold Urey. They reproduced an artificial atmosphere to simulate what they thought might be early earth conditions. They then added the necessary soup components into that atmosphere, then applied electricity. The result was the spontaneous organization of organic molecules. The initial results were hailed as a huge step forward in human understanding of origins. Only later did the various problems with the experiment come to light. First, the simulated atmosphere, made up primarily of methane and ammonia, is universally rejected as impossible as an early Earth atmosphere. Very high electric charges had to be used to cause formation of the organic (carbon-based) molecules. The molecules generated were actually cyanide and formaldehyde, both of which are lethal to living cells. Although the Miller-Urey experiments have now been discredited and generally disavowed even by Evolutionists, the basic idea still lingers. Some text books in use today still provide a false impression that these experiments effectively demonstrated how life arose. Thus far every successful attempt to organize atoms, molecules, chemicals of any other level of complexity has involved the careful and purposeful implementation of an intelligent design under tightly controlled conditions not found in nature. It seems, then, that for man to create he must play at God, imitating Him with purpose, design, and very careful hands.

26. Cells—The Building Blocks of Life

“And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul.” Gen 2:7 (NASB)

In Origin of Species, Charles Darwin wrote, “If it could be demonstrated that any complex organ existed which could not possibly have been formed by numerous, successive, slight modifications, my theory would absolutely break down.” In the 19th century it was supposed that a cell was the smallest component of an organ. Neither Darwin nor biologists of his time could have guessed at the true complexity of a living cell as we know about it today. The real question is less about total complexity and more about the possibility of development of complex systems from simple components.

A cell consists of many components, but no component is as uniquely complex as DNA. The nucleus of a cell contains DNA, the library of blueprints needed to produce any part of any cell in the organism. Stem cells are highly prized because they contain a complete DNA library—most other cells contain only the partial DNA required for specific functions. DNA is three-dimensional structure built of pairs of acids, linked by sugars, arranged in strings to form sections called chromosomes. Human DNA consists of 46 chromosomes. DNA of even the most basic organism is highly complex. There are at least five million unique sets of DNA in existence because there are that many unique life forms.

A living cell holds thousands of complex enzymes. Each enzyme comes into being in response to a gene (a strand of DNA). The information in each strand of DNA must be at least as complex as the enzyme it controls. A medium protein includes about 300 amino acids. The DNA gene controlling this cell has about 1000 nucleotides in its chain. There are four types of nucleotides in a chain, which means there is about 41000 or 10600 possible combinations of data. To put this into some sort of meaningful perspective, suppose each word in a book represents one of those pieces of data. If you assume there’s an average of 500 words per page and 500 pages per book, then assume 10,000 copies each of 10,000,000 books are published each year. Assume books have published at this rate for a period of 4000 years. The total number of meaningful words ever published would amount to 1066. The information in a single DNA molecule is therefore 10534 times the number of words ever published assuming books were published since before the time of Moses at today’s pace.

For a cell to reproduce you must have the original cell and the controlling gene (portion of DNA library related to the cell) containing the information necessary for duplication. The gene is embedded in the cell, therefore you must not only have the complex cell but the cell must contain all the genetic information to self-replicate. Which came first, the blueprint for the cell or the cell needed to house the blueprint?

In most cells RNA acts like the librarian for the DNA library. RNA copies the necessary elements of DNA and checks them out to other parts of the cell. In addition to information transmission, a power supply is needed to run things. The power plant in most animal organisms is called the mitochondria and in plants it is called the chloroplast. The power plant machinery is the most substantial difference between animal and plant cells. A factory called the ribosome takes information from the RNA messenger and energy from the mitochondria (or chloroplast) power plant to manufacture new or replacement proteins, DNA, or another ribosome. After a ribosome factory cranks out some new component, the gogli warehouse stores and functions as distribution center for the cell. Endoplasmic reticulum is the trucking company used to transport ribosome’s produce from the gogli warehouse to the final destination. Trucks need roads on which to carry their goods. This is where the centrosome highway network comes in. From time to time a parking lot is required for temporary storage while the trucking company negotiates traffic. Vacuoles function like parking lots here and there along the centrosome highways. Integrated into this system are fuel consumption and waste disposal mechanisms. Lysomes digest food, bacteria, and other cell parts that are worn out to create the raw fuel used by the power plant and other working components in the cell. Peroxisomes process waste, sometimes by causing a damaged cell to self-destruct for the good of the organism. A basic cell houses all of these common parts, yet is only 1 to 100 microns in diameter.

Darwinian Evolution requires naturally increasing complexity. The basic idea is that two very small function components can be put together to form a higher level functional device. Two higher level devices can be combined to make an even more complex machine. There are two major difficulties with this basic principle at the heart of Darwinian Evolution. The first, entropy, was covered largely in a previous chapter. Entropy is the principle which states order tends to decrease unless useful energy (or information) is added from an external source. With regard to biological systems, a complimentary principle called irreducible complexity is the other major problem.

The principle of irreducible complexity is that some things cannot be made any simpler without loosing usefulness. For example, a basic mousetrap might require five components to function. If any of those parts are missing, the trap will not work. Placing the parts in a box and shaking the box almost certainly is not going to result in a working mousetrap no matter how long you shake the box. Any four of the parts, even if put together properly, will not make a working trap. All five parts must be present and must be properly assembled by an intelligent builder. Additional parts could be added to enhance the basic trap, but no parts can be removed or it ceases to be a trap. The five-part trap is an irreducibly complex machine.

There are many examples of irreducible complexity in biology, from eyes to bacteria flagellum. Human eyes are more complex than insect eyes, yet the most basic eye of the most basic animal cannot be simplified even slightly without the loss of vision. A blind eye serves no evolutionary value because, according to Darwin’s application of natural selection, the blind eye is not useful and would be rejected. Evolutionary theory supposes increasing complexity through natural selection, but it cannot explain the original organization of very specialized components needed to receive, perceive, and transmit visual information. On the cellular, consider bacteria flagellum. A single flagellum is essentially a rotary propeller. It operates at 10,000 RPM and includes a universal joint, bushings, bearings, and the whip propeller. If even one protein were missing, of the wrong type, or in the wrong position, the flagellum would be useless.

As illustrated in this chapter, living things are made up of cells. Cells contain many small and complicated parts including the instructions and mechanisms needed to reproduce. When examined closely, many components of cells serve no useful purpose unless they are complete. A cell cannot reproduce unless it contains both the complete replicating components and the DNA instructions used by the replicating components. In this basic sense any sort of living cell is, by its nature, irreducibly complex. Many organs, such as the highly complex eye, cannot be significantly simplified without being useless. Cold rational logic suggests that the evolutionary notion that irreducibly complex organs, cells, or even specialized and necessary proteins could be the product of beneficial chance mutation is utterly untenable. The alternative, no matter how unpleasant to a being who thinks himself (or herself) to be no more than their material biology, must be rejected only on the basis of emotional commitment to denial of the truth. It is the desire of mankind to rebel against God and make himself (or herself) their own master. If the alternative is allowed, that an intelligent unseen supernatural Creator might actually exist. If there is a Creator, then perhaps there is also a biblical heaven, hell, Jesus Christ, and Holy Spirit. Moral absolutes—holiness and sin—would then have to be faced and dealt with.

27. Natural Selection

“Let us choose what is right; let us know among ourselves what is good.” - Job 34:4 (ESV)

The theory of evolution, as articulated by Darwin, is built on a principle called natural selection. Darwin believed that natural selection was the mechanism by which certain random beneficial mutations are retained resulting in diversity of descending species. The idea is both simple and elegant.

The components of Darwin’s theory were not really new. The idea that life arose and spread and spontaneously increased in complexity and diversity by some purely natural means dates back thousands of years. The principle of natural selection was introduced in the early 19th century, just a few years before Darwin’s now famous trip. Ironically, the principle of natural selection was first proposed by a Christian who was also an outspoken Creationist. Darwin’s theory was unique in that he combined the previously pantheistic or animist belief in evolution with a scientific principle. He successfully sold his idea because he was able to legitimize a previously pagan belief with the guise of scientific enlightenment.

Evolutionary theory cannot be rejected out of hand simply because its underlying philosophy has pagan origins. It also should not be accepted as fact just because it relies on another scientific principle, natural selection. Both the philosophical underpinning and the scientific principles involved need to be examined. Simple and elegant do not automatically make it true.

Evolutionary theory requires descent with modification. Modification means mutation. Mutation is when a cell or some part of a cell does not replicate itself accurately. In nature, mutations that are “beneficial” to the living creature are extremely rare. Mutations that increase net genetic complexity or information have never been observed in nature. Almost all mutations reduce the net order to some degree and damage the creature. Such mutations often make the animal susceptible to sterility or death. Oddballs in nature are generally shunned or targeted for death.

Natural selection is often thought to mean survival of the fittest. A much more accurate description would be survival of the conformist. Survival of the “fittest” is really only true in the sense that the norm is considered fit and the nonconformist is less fit. For example, when a tiger and lion mate the resulting liger is always sterile. When a donkey and a horse mate the mule is always sterile. Albinos of almost any animal species are another abhorration of nature that are usually killed soon after birth in the wild. Conjoined twins, like two-headed snakes, almost never survive in the wild. Natural selection actually protects nature from evolution by preventing abnormality whether by mutation or by interbreeding.

Natural selection is often credited with explaining genetic variation within a “kind.” For example, new dog breeds appear all over the world. Generating new breeds is better explained with Mendel's principles of dominant and recessive genes than with natural selection. A large dog and a small dog may produce offspring which are large with short legs, long with large legs, or some other combination of features of its parents. Continued breeding may produce more of the same features and some with other features. By mating offspring of similar features, the information needed to produce either of the original parents is eventually bred out completely. Although later generations of the new breed have a more limited gene pool, they are still dogs and can still mate with other breeds of dog. Natural selection comes into play only if an offspring is actually defective or sterile.

Adaptation to environmental factors may be considered a form of natural selection. When the environment changes, genetic characteristics better suited to the changed environment tend to become the most desirable for mating. For example, animals with white fur like polar bears prefer to breed with others of the same limited genetic stock to preserve their environmentally advantageous fur color. Although polar bears and grizzly bears can and do on rare occasion mate, they generally prefer to avoid mating because their offspring will have some mixture of traits less desirable in either of their natural habitats.

Diversity within a given animal kind is the result of breeding out one or another genetic quality, usually involving geographical segregation for a period of time. Random natural mutations are very rarely beneficial and have never been observed to add complexity to the genetic information of the organism. Natural selection rejects offspring with substantial mutations or flaws (albinos, conjoined twins, etc.) or descent from parents of similar yet sufficiently different DNA (donkey and horse, tiger and lion, etc.). Entropy dictates that order and organization will naturally degrade over time. Natural selection, rather than an instrument of change, is a well documented natural phenomena whereby living things in nature overcome the effects of entropy by rejecting mutation and interbreeding of different kinds of organisms. The fact is that natural selection is a counter-agent to Evolution in every way.

28. Common Descent or Common Design?

“He has filled them with skill to perform every work of an engraver and of a designer and of an embroiderer, in blue and in purple and in scarlet material, and in fine linen, and of a weaver, as performers of every work and makers of designs.” Ex 35:35 (NASB)

Scripture says that man was created in God’s likeness. It also says God created everything. It stands to reason that if God designed and formed all we see in our world, He would endow the people created in His image with some ability to design and construct what they design. No other living thing makes complex tools and uses them to construct complex and artistic things for their own pleasure like humans. Many creatures fashion homes for themselves, but only humans draw up blueprints and hire help who can read those prints and build to a specification. Certain animals are known to use sticks or other objects they find as rudimentary tools or weapons, but only humans observe, design, and refine complex and efficient tools used for abstract and artistic purposes. Spiders weave beautiful webs, but their webs are built by instinct to perform a narrow range of functions. Beavers build homes inside dams with an underwater entrance, but they do not hang pictures on the wall nor invite friends over for card night.

The keen eye will observe countless similarities between various creatures, including humans. Evolutionists frequently cite these similarities as evidence of common descent. Creationists, on the other hand, cite the same similarities as evidence of a common Designer. Similarities are interesting and very useful in many ways, however it is the differences which draw the line between one kind of organism and another. An entire branch of biology, called taxonomy, is dedicated to identifying differences in organisms.

Almost all vertebrate animals have a head with a mouth, nose, two eyes, and a skull housing a brain. These similarities, touted as the result of common descent, are very superficial in light of the radical differences between various creatures within the realm of vertebrates. For example, a horse and a frog both have these features, yet they are radically different. One has hair, the other has none. One is easily a thousand times heavier than the other. In addition to obvious differences in appearance, various internal organs are different, much of their genetic codes are different, and their reproduction processes are different.

Even if you consider the donkey and horse, two animals seemingly very similar, there remain startling differences which make it easy for a child to tell them apart. Sufficiently similar creatures, like a horse and a donkey, may sometimes breed. When this happens critical genetic differences result in sterile offspring—in this case a mule. Evolutionists try to explain this problem as the result of extinction of various intermediary evolutionary stages. If that were so, it still would not explain why supposedly similar creatures cannot bare fertile offspring. Instead, what we observe in nature are clear and unyielding boundaries between organisms large and small.

Insects are relatively small (compared with vertebrates) and have three body parts with six legs, regardless of the insect species. Exoskeletons provide excellent protection from the environment for comparatively smaller creatures. Unfortunately, the lack of internal bones makes it impossible to support large internal organs. Conversely, complex organ systems work best in an environment without a rigid external boundary like that of an insect’s exoskeleton. In each case the creature’s form is ideally suited to its size and lifestyle. Natural selection fails to explain why some creatures have internal skeletons while others have external skeletons, each ideally suited to size and function, yet both are skeletons. Both are said to have developed common characteristics like legs, eyes, and so forth, yet these developments must have happened independently.

The parallel development of similar features in evolutionarily unrelated organisms is called parallelism or convergence. Birds, bats, and many insects are capable of winged flight. Certain types of spiders, snakes, and marine life are venomous. Many of the other things mentioned above are also considered examples of parallelism. A few others would be teeth, legs, toenails, tails, and so on. On the other hand, divergence is the term for extreme differences between otherwise relatively similar living things. Divergence is the basis of taxonomy. Without divergence it would not be possible to clearly classify one kind of organism with respect to another. The evolution model utterly fails to adequately explain parallelism and divergence.

In all but a few asexual species of relatively low animal life, animals of every type from insect to arachnid to mammal reproduce only by male and female heterosexual sex. Even plant life has “male” and “female” counterparts that must combine to reproduce. Most animals have a heart and circulatory system, a breathing system (lungs, gills, etc.), nervous system, and so forth. Most plants have roots, leaves, photosynthesis, nutrient flow, and breathing systems. There are many more similarities between plant and animal cells than there are differences, yet no one confuses plants and animals. Vision, hearing, touch, taste and smell are common across most of the animal kingdom. Although sensory systems of other kingdoms (such as plants, bacteria, viruses, etc) are less well understood, at least some form of ability to sense environment exists in almost all living organisms down to as little complexity as a single cell. Living things need certain things to survive. These include the right environment (heat, light, shelter), food, water, air, and a mate. Most organisms will react to their environment in ways that optimize their ability to survive and thrive. To this end we experience hunger, thirst, hot and cold, and so forth.

Ultimately, there is no logical reason to suppose the first randomly combined organic molecules formed by chance with sensory systems capable of helping those few molecules survive and thrive. Perhaps most curious is the notion that such randomly formed molecules would have any sort of will to procreate and survive in an environment which would by any reckoning be brutally hostile. A rational mind must confront these difficulties and in so doing must see that soup to man evolution is only possible in the wishful thinking of a man who seeks to deny the alternative.

While similarities may provide broad support for both Evolution and Creation, it is in the differences where we find Evolutionary theory becoming untenable. The existence of an intelligent Designer the only reasonable possibility. The evidence of similarity and differences in the living things we observe demand we recognize the earmarks of design. Creation is a matter of faith in a specific account of origins just as Evolution is likewise a matter of faith in a man-made concept of origins. Between these two faiths, only Creation accepts the existence of an intelligent designer.

29. Missing Links

“Now a river flowed out of Eden to water the garden; and from there it divided and became four rivers.”—Gen 2:10 (NASB)

The most popular problem with Darwin’s theory is the system of gaps distinctly dividing one sort of organism from another. The “missing link” has been as much the subject of science fiction as vampires or aliens with no better evidence in reality. The gaps dividing one kind of plant or animal from other similar kinds remain as much a much a fact in the fossil record as in the living record. The Theory of Evolution requires slow, small, continual transitions caused by natural mutation. The obvious prediction is that life would progress in a continuum from least to most complex. In spite of attempts to illustrate imaginary links, the evidence available to date suggests the links are in fact missing.

Taxonomy is the science of classification of life forms. It is a science that studies the arrangement and ordering of life and classifies the life into a logical hierarchy by observing distinct characteristics. This logical hierarchy is most often described using a “tree” style. The science of taxonomy superficially appears to illustrate similarities such as would favor the continuous variability required by evolutionary theory. However, as a science, taxonomic observations are meaningful precisely because of distinct differences, not general similarities. Life is ranked into kingdom, phylum, class, order, family, genus, and species. Evolution assumes life began with very small and simple components which multiplied and over time different groups took different “evolutionary paths.” Some of that original life became what is today the plant kingdom while other life became the animal kingdom. Some developed exoskeletons (insects) with six legs while others developed endoskeletons (internal bones) and others developed into things like arachnids, jellyfish, and so forth. As illustrated in the previous chapter, the evidence of similarity, on its own, is no more proof of Evolution than of similarity of design. It is into the differences where we must delve.

The eye is one of the most complex organs in any seeing animal. The Evolution model predicts a continuum from non-seeing to seeing organisms. The Evolution model fails to provide a reason for the spontaneous development of this feature, let alone a mechanism for the incredible jump from blind to seeing animals. What we observe is a gap between seeing and non-seeing animals today and in the fossil record.

Lungs convert oxygen from air into a vital component in blood. Fish use gills to accomplish a similar function. Even insects breathe. Plants perform a different conversion process, but even so they must perform conversion processes involving O2 and CO2 to live. All animal and plant life must take in nutrition in addition to air. Simple and complex organisms do this by vastly different means, not to mention the incredible difference between plant and animal processes. If Evolution is true, why do spiders see when worms cannot? How did insects get a rigid shell when mammals have rigid internal bones? Why do humans have one stomach and cow has four and birds have none? Why don’t we simply absorb oxygen through our skin the way plants absorb CO2 through their leaves? In the Evolution model there are incomprehensible gaps not only between kinds of animals, but between the anatomical have and have-nots.

Taxonomy is possible because biological kinds are unique in very specific and significant ways. These observed gaps in living kinds drive Evolutionists to the fossil record in hopes of filling in these gaps. By doing so they believe they can make science fit their philosophy. Unfortunately for Evolution, the gaps are just as clear in the fossil record.

Evolutionists have many questions of their own about the fossil record. For example, there is an unexplained jump from protozoan to metazoan invertebrates. There is no known evolutionary progenitor for trilobites. There is nothing in the gap between vertebrates and invertebrates. There is nothing between spines and shells. There is nothing between fish and amphibians, between amphibian and reptile, or between reptile and bird or mammal. There are no clearly identified fish with leg precursors. The nearest such animal, the coelacanth, was thought extinct in the Mesozoic era until one was caught off the coast of Madagascar in 1938. It was found to have a body and bone structure identical to its fossil, supposedly millions of years old. There are 32 orders of mammals and no indication of any transitions in the fossil record to or between them. The fact some reptiles like pterodactyls could fly does not prove they became birds any more than bats prove mammals came from reptiles.

Relatively few fossilized animals or plants are extinct today in spite of the modern rate of extinction in both kingdoms. While this presents its own math problem for evolution, more profound is the fact that most fossils almost identically represent their living counterparts today. Either the vast majority of life stops evolving after it gets some of its members fossilized or else the fossil record is not necessarily all that old after all. Regardless, the fact that modern gaps match fossil gaps only amplifies the gap problem for Evolution. Conversely, the creation model predicts systematic gaps.

Evolution necessarily requires a vast period of time. To accommodate this, the fossil record is presented is presented in ways which make it appear that the “lowest” forms of life are found in fossil remains at the bottom of the geological columns and the “higher” forms of life are found nearer the surface. It is statistically true that simple organisms are often buried deeper, although this is by no means always the case. In fact, fossil layers often pose serious problems for Evolutionists who, in some cases, resort to supporting catastrophe theories—such as large regional floods—to explain the problems in the geologic columns. Still, the common model remains firmly entrenched across a range of sciences.

Punctuated equilibrium is a relatively recent term used to describe long periods of little or no Evolution with sudden jumps called quantum speciation. These terms sound good, but completely lack genetic evidence. Perhaps one of the biggest mysteries and problems within the evolutionary scheme is the widely accepted "Cambrian explosion." The term Cambrian explosion refers to the sudden appearance of a wealth of diverse life about 250 millions years ago. Much of the original animal life from which modern animals supposedly evolved popped onto the scene in what amounts to a geological or Evolutionary instant.

Revelation is limited by the words issued through the prophet. The revelation cannot change or it ceases to be revelation. Science has no such limitation. Modern Evolution is presented as science. Evolution is therefore a fluid philosophy subject to change whenever hard science throws a roadblock in the way of this or that aspect of Evolutionary theory. Hard science—real life observations of repeatable and testable cause and effect—has never presented an insurmountable problem to the plain biblical account of Creation. On the other hand, hard science frequently force changes to the human idea we call the Theory of Evolution. This alone should provoke the scientific community to reexamine its support for Evolution and the corresponding lack of credence it lends to the revelation of the biblical Creation account.

30. Filling In The Gaps

“I searched for a man among them who would build up the wall and stand in the gap before Me for the land, so that I would not destroy it; but I found no one.” Ezekiel 22:30 (NASB).

Although Evolutionists have presented various arguments as to why the gaps are not a big problem, they continue to hunt for a smoking gun to prove their case. Their quest is two fold—first to silence Creationists, second to remove lingering doubt in the minds of the public. A number of “missing links” have presented in an effort to fill in some of the gaps. While some are genuine and quite interesting, many fakes have created revenue and sensationalism with much less news of their later falsification.

In the 1860’s a fossil dubbed “archaeopteryx” was unearthed from a German quarry. Its unusual features include a tail resembling a lizard and unusual claws. It was first thought to be half-bird and half-reptile—the missing link from reptile to bird. Birds have a number of very distinct characteristics from reptiles including wings, feathers, wishbone, weight distribution, and so forth. Studies have proven this animal is a member of a now extinct group of birds and was not at all reptilian. Even using evolutionary index fossil dating, this particular bird is supposed to have lived later than its supposed progeny, not before. Although this was a genuine and fascinating find, it fails to fill any gaps.

Darwin’s tree of life and its supporters tell us fish grew legs and came on land. The problem is that there are no fish with leg precursors. The nearest such animal, the coelacanth, was thought extinct in the Mesozoic era until one was caught off the coast of Madagascar in 1938. It was found to have a body and bone structure identical to it’s supposedly millions of years old fossilized ancestors. This “prehistoric” fish does not have legs or any “precursor” to legs. That it lives today testifies to its uniqueness as a kind rather than its supposed place as a transitional creature.

A more recent example of a supposed transitional fossil, called Archaeoraptor, was presented in 1999 as part bird and part dinosaur. It was touted as clear evidence of a missing link until it was proven to be a fake. A Chinese paleontologist created it by gluing a dinosaur tail onto the fossil of a now extinct bird. Unfortunately many fake fossils are presented as new finds because they are very profitable.

In Florida another fossil was dubbed “bambiraptor.” It was a chicken sized dinosaur with what was purported to be turkey DNA. A reconstruction presented to the public used certain bird elements, such as eagle eyes, to make it appear more birdlike. The DNA evidence, it turns out, was actually contamination from a technician’s lunch.

Among the most interesting and compelling to the general public are fossils believed to represent the transition toward modern man from some pre-human ancestor. Of them, Java Man is thought to be the ultimate icon of missing links. Dutch scientist Eugene Dubois discovered Java Man in Indonesia in 1891/92. What he found was a skull fragment among some bones by a riverbank. Many people believe Java Man included a complete skull which was smaller than modern man’s. This idea was meant to prove earlier man had lower intelligence. Java Man actually included only a skullcap along with a few teeth and a femur. Analysis of the skullcap shows that while the bones were from a relatively small human, the brain capacity was well within modern norms.

Neanderthal has a more pronounced brow and slightly different head shape. There are a few dozen samples of these various skulls and other bones. These samples have all yielded brain sizes well within the normal range of modern humans. Other bones from these bodies, when found, have shown little if any other differences from modern man. The brow and skull differences could easily be explained by disease or, more likely in light of the biblical account, great age. The racial variation of homo erectus and especially Neanderthal compared to homo sapien have been wildly exaggerated in artistic renderings to promote the concept of Darwin’s tree. Examination of physical evidence shows the differences between these races are superficial.

Once the illusions are exposed and we are faced with the fact that early man is nothing other than early man, the next avenue is to pursue similarity between ape and man. Taxonomic classifications are based on clear distinctions between organisms of varying degrees of similarity. DNA similarity is also used as evidence for Evolution. In spite of the difficulty in DNA coming to be by Evolution, the relative similarity in DNA structure is what Evolutionists concentrate on. Ape DNA, we are often told, is about 99% similar to human DNA. This number is grossly exaggerated, based largely on similarities in specific certain similar genes. It does not consider the broader range of genetic material, interstitial DNA strands, and the incredible fact that humans and apes have a different number of chromosomes. It is interesting to note that using the same criteria, mouse DNA is also roughly 99% similar to human DNA. Obviously great similarity does not matter nearly as much as minute differences.

Darwin’s original “tree of life” was essentially just a spreadsheet. Earnst Haeckel, a contemporary of Darwin, published sketches of a tree with branches depicting various kinds of life with differences being more minute as you move from trunk to branch to twig. He based his research on the same sources used by Darwin and quickly capitalized on Darwin’s work when it was published. Haeckel then published a set of sketches as vivid proof of similarity of species at their earliest stages of development. The images showed embryos of a fish, salamander, tortoise, chicken, hog, calf, rabbit, and human side by side at three stages of development. The similarities are supposed to support his and Darwin’s tree of life sketches and the idea of common ancestry.

In the 1860s Haeckel’s drawings were proven false. Modern photographs of embryos of these creatures do not match Haeckel’s drawings. His drawings were deliberately doctored to misrepresent the real appearance of the embryos. Although thoroughly discredited, evolutionists persist in promoting this myth even today. The false images and romantic lore are compelling to impressionable minds.

Those who continue to promote Haeckel’s lie conveniently disregard the reasons why the embryo art is false. Embryo selections were “cherry picked” to give the closest appearance of similarity. There are several classes of vertebrates, yet Haeckel only used examples from a few that came closer to providing the desired result. He then compounded similarities by “editing” the pictures. Haeckel also claimed the images were from the earliest stages of embryonic development. That was also untrue. His drawings were based on mid-term development when the cells have begun to develop and grow, after the first several rounds of cell reproduction and before they begin to take on truly unique appearance. During this period there is greater similarity than either early cell division or the later obvious development of body structure.

Following in Haeckel’s footsteps, in 1996 Life published pictures of a human embryo at a stage that made it look as if the embryo had something resembling gills. Many modern biology books promote similar ideas about the appearance of the human embryo. Of course the folds of skin at a certain stage when the embryo is still doubled over itself may look a bit like gills, but it is a normal stage of embryonic development. Most of us have folds in our adult skin, but no one suggests those folds could be used for breathing under water.

In spite of all this, many modern textbooks still use Haeckel’s drawings or something similar as proof of evolution. Evolutionists who are aware of these problems still claim that while the details contain errors, the concept is still true. It is not true. Most textbooks used in high schools and college biology classes still support Haeckel’s concept if not the artwork itself. Haeckel’s basic argument was that similarity argues for evolution. Similarity of design is just as easily argued, but the argument of design is unacceptable in the modern classroom. Design also accounts for the differences, parallelisms, and other observations of nature where evolution fails. It is a travesty that science has been sacrificed on the altar of religious dogma—the religion of naturalism known as Darwinian Evolution. Perhaps the Lord’s brother, James, said it best when he said, “Religion that is pure and undefiled before God, the Father, is this: to visit orphans and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unstained from the world.” (Jas 1:27, ESV).

30. Filling In The Gaps

“I searched for a man among them who would build up the wall and stand in the gap before Me for the land, so that I would not destroy it; but I found no one.” Ezekiel 22:30 (NASB).

Although Evolutionists have presented various arguments as to why the gaps are not a big problem, they continue to hunt for a smoking gun to prove their case. Their quest is two fold—first to silence Creationists, second to remove lingering doubt in the minds of the public. A number of “missing links” have presented in an effort to fill in some of the gaps. While some are genuine and quite interesting, many fakes have created revenue and sensationalism with much less news of their later falsification.

In the 1860’s a fossil dubbed “archaeopteryx” was unearthed from a German quarry. Its unusual features include a tail resembling a lizard and unusual claws. It was first thought to be half-bird and half-reptile—the missing link from reptile to bird. Birds have a number of very distinct characteristics from reptiles including wings, feathers, wishbone, weight distribution, and so forth. Studies have proven this animal is a member of a now extinct group of birds and was not at all reptilian. Even using evolutionary index fossil dating, this particular bird is supposed to have lived later than its supposed progeny, not before. Although this was a genuine and fascinating find, it fails to fill any gaps.

Darwin’s tree of life and its supporters tell us fish grew legs and came on land. The problem is that there are no fish with leg precursors. The nearest such animal, the coelacanth, was thought extinct in the Mesozoic era until one was caught off the coast of Madagascar in 1938. It was found to have a body and bone structure identical to it’s supposedly millions of years old fossilized ancestors. This “prehistoric” fish does not have legs or any “precursor” to legs. That it lives today testifies to its uniqueness as a kind rather than its supposed place as a transitional creature.

A more recent example of a supposed transitional fossil, called Archaeoraptor, was presented in 1999 as part bird and part dinosaur. It was touted as clear evidence of a missing link until it was proven to be a fake. A Chinese paleontologist created it by gluing a dinosaur tail onto the fossil of a now extinct bird. Unfortunately many fake fossils are presented as new finds because they are very profitable.

In Florida another fossil was dubbed “bambiraptor.” It was a chicken sized dinosaur with what was purported to be turkey DNA. A reconstruction presented to the public used certain bird elements, such as eagle eyes, to make it appear more birdlike. The DNA evidence, it turns out, was actually contamination from a technician’s lunch.

Among the most interesting and compelling to the general public are fossils believed to represent the transition toward modern man from some pre-human ancestor. Of them, Java Man is thought to be the ultimate icon of missing links. Dutch scientist Eugene Dubois discovered Java Man in Indonesia in 1891/92. What he found was a skull fragment among some bones by a riverbank. Many people believe Java Man included a complete skull which was smaller than modern man’s. This idea was meant to prove earlier man had lower intelligence. Java Man actually included only a skullcap along with a few teeth and a femur. Analysis of the skullcap shows that while the bones were from a relatively small human, the brain capacity was well within modern norms.

Neanderthal has a more pronounced brow and slightly different head shape. There are a few dozen samples of these various skulls and other bones. These samples have all yielded brain sizes well within the normal range of modern humans. Other bones from these bodies, when found, have shown little if any other differences from modern man. The brow and skull differences could easily be explained by disease or, more likely in light of the biblical account, great age. The racial variation of homo erectus and especially Neanderthal compared to homo sapien have been wildly exaggerated in artistic renderings to promote the concept of Darwin’s tree. Examination of physical evidence shows the differences between these races are superficial.

Once the illusions are exposed and we are faced with the fact that early man is nothing other than early man, the next avenue is to pursue similarity between ape and man. Taxonomic classifications are based on clear distinctions between organisms of varying degrees of similarity. DNA similarity is also used as evidence for Evolution. In spite of the difficulty in DNA coming to be by Evolution, the relative similarity in DNA structure is what Evolutionists concentrate on. Ape DNA, we are often told, is about 99% similar to human DNA. This number is grossly exaggerated, based largely on similarities in specific certain similar genes. It does not consider the broader range of genetic material, interstitial DNA strands, and the incredible fact that humans and apes have a different number of chromosomes. It is interesting to note that using the same criteria, mouse DNA is also roughly 99% similar to human DNA. Obviously great similarity does not matter nearly as much as minute differences.

Darwin’s original “tree of life” was essentially just a spreadsheet. Earnst Haeckel, a contemporary of Darwin, published sketches of a tree with branches depicting various kinds of life with differences being more minute as you move from trunk to branch to twig. He based his research on the same sources used by Darwin and quickly capitalized on Darwin’s work when it was published. Haeckel then published a set of sketches as vivid proof of similarity of species at their earliest stages of development. The images showed embryos of a fish, salamander, tortoise, chicken, hog, calf, rabbit, and human side by side at three stages of development. The similarities are supposed to support his and Darwin’s tree of life sketches and the idea of common ancestry.

In the 1860s Haeckel’s drawings were proven false. Modern photographs of embryos of these creatures do not match Haeckel’s drawings. His drawings were deliberately doctored to misrepresent the real appearance of the embryos. Although thoroughly discredited, evolutionists persist in promoting this myth even today. The false images and romantic lore are compelling to impressionable minds.

Those who continue to promote Haeckel’s lie conveniently disregard the reasons why the embryo art is false. Embryo selections were “cherry picked” to give the closest appearance of similarity. There are several classes of vertebrates, yet Haeckel only used examples from a few that came closer to providing the desired result. He then compounded similarities by “editing” the pictures. Haeckel also claimed the images were from the earliest stages of embryonic development. That was also untrue. His drawings were based on mid-term development when the cells have begun to develop and grow, after the first several rounds of cell reproduction and before they begin to take on truly unique appearance. During this period there is greater similarity than either early cell division or the later obvious development of body structure.

Following in Haeckel’s footsteps, in 1996 Life published pictures of a human embryo at a stage that made it look as if the embryo had something resembling gills. Many modern biology books promote similar ideas about the appearance of the human embryo. Of course the folds of skin at a certain stage when the embryo is still doubled over itself may look a bit like gills, but it is a normal stage of embryonic development. Most of us have folds in our adult skin, but no one suggests those folds could be used for breathing under water.

In spite of all this, many modern textbooks still use Haeckel’s drawings or something similar as proof of evolution. Evolutionists who are aware of these problems still claim that while the details contain errors, the concept is still true. It is not true. Most textbooks used in high schools and college biology classes still support Haeckel’s concept if not the artwork itself. Haeckel’s basic argument was that similarity argues for evolution. Similarity of design is just as easily argued, but the argument of design is unacceptable in the modern classroom. Design also accounts for the differences, parallelisms, and other observations of nature where evolution fails. It is a travesty that science has been sacrificed on the altar of religious dogma—the religion of naturalism known as Darwinian Evolution. Perhaps the Lord’s brother, James, said it best when he said, “Religion that is pure and undefiled before God, the Father, is this: to visit orphans and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unstained from the world.” (Jas 1:27, ESV).

31. Dinosaurs

“Behold, Behemoth, which I made as I made you; he eats grass like an ox… Behold, his strength in his loins, and his power in the muscles of his belly. He makes his tail stiff like a cedar; the sinews of his thighs are knit together. His bones are tubes of bronze, his limbs like bars of iron.” Job 40:15-18 (ESV)

Few of God’s creatures capture the imagination like mighty dinosaurs. Evolutionists tell us dinosaurs became extinct about 65 million years ago. They tell us man first appeared as much as a million years or so ago to perhaps just a few tens of thousands of years ago. Although they cannot give an exact figure for dinosaur’s departure or man’s arrival, they are uniformly adamant that man and dinosaur never lived together. But does the fact that dinosaurs are extinct today necessarily require that they became extinct millions ago? Why are Evolutionists so certain dinosaurs could not have roamed the earth at the same time as man?

The biblical account plainly reveals that God made land animals on the sixth day of the Creation week (Gen 1:24). Dinosaurs fit the description of creatures made on the sixth day. There is no biblical account of animal extinction prior to the completion of the creation week. There is no room in [a plain reading of] the Creation account for dinosaur extinction before the arrival of man. This can only mean dinosaurs must have lived at the same time as man.

Exactly how dinosaurs became extinct is as much a mystery for Creationists as for Evolutionists. Both camps propose a range of likely causes fitting with their respective models. The important difference is not how, but when. Popular Evolutionist theories about dinosaur extinction generally involve a major break in the food chain caused by catastrophic climate change, perhaps caused by an asteroid impact or massive volcanic activity. The prime Creationist theory is that although dinosaurs were represented on Noah’s ark, most were unable to survive for long on the initially barren post-flood earth. They then suppose the few dinosaurs hardy enough to survive the first years after the flood were probably hunted either for food or to eliminate threats to humans and their livestock. It is interesting, if you step back from these two theories, to see the degree of similarity in the big picture. Aside from the time scale and the involvement of humans in the eventual elimination of most post-flood dinosaurs, both theories involve planetary catastrophe and difficulties with the food chain.

Regardless of how dinosaurs became extinct, the biblical account leaves no doubt that they roamed the earth with humans. The book of Job includes descriptions of great land and water creatures called Behemoth (Job 40:15-24) and Leviathan (Job 41) respectively. In those closing chapters of Job, God is confronting Job’s self-righteous attitude and displaying His own glory in order to humble Job. Job is shown two huge creatures, Behemoth and Leviathan. Behemoth is described as grazing and having strong loins and powerful belly. Behemoth’s tail is like a cedar, his sinews are knit together, his bones are like tubes of bronze, and his limbs like bars of iron. Behemoth is described as roaming far and wide and having no fear of swamps, mountains, or the Jordan River during the spring floods. God asks Job the rhetorical question, “Can anyone take him by his eyes or pierce his nose with a snare?” This creature is sometimes thought to be an elephant or rhinoceros, but those animals do not have great tails. They do not wade through floods. They prefer to graze on plains. Although these are fearsome beasts, God called Behemoth first or foremost of his great animal creations. It seems far more likely that Job saw what we would call a bracheasaur or brontosaur.

Leviathan is similarly fearsome and untamable, except that Leviathan is described as living in the sea. Leviathan has rows of teeth and tight rows of shields along his back. He sneezes light and breathes fire, has a great neck, and he is difficult if not impossible to capture or kill. This passage is sometimes thought to be the source (or product) of sea dragon myths. Some dinosaurs are known to have lived in the sea, such as plesiosaur. The matter of breathing fire at first sounds entirely contrived, but it may not be so far fetched as one might imagine. There are nearly 500 species of fish that give off electric charge or emit a phosphorescent glow. Some reptiles and numerous sea creatures are known to store venom and other toxins in their bodies, including certain types of oils. It is certainly within the realm of possibility that a creature could have existed once that combined electric charge with an abundant oil producing gland to “sneeze sparks.”

Perhaps the most amazing aspect of the biblical account is that it describes creatures modern Evolutionary paleontologists claim were found only in the last two to three centuries. It seems highly unlikely a text written thousands of years ago could describe creatures buried for millions of years and only recently discovered—unless of course those creatures actually lived during the time the text was first written.

The bible is not the only ancient record depicting what we would call dinosaurs. Around the world there are museum displays of ancient art depicting the hunting of animals that do not have modern parallels, but do appear to be various types of dinosaurs. Most such artwork is very ancient, dating to the first several centuries after the Flood of Noah. Most well known are Chinese depictions of fire-breathing dragons. European folklore includes stories of its own great beasts, several of which are similar to the creature that the Beowulf tale calls a Grindel. There ancient oral and written records of creatures we would call pterodactyls such diverse places as western China and in the Upper Nile region. While any one of these might seem anecdotal at best, taken together they strongly suggest the survival of a diverse though shrinking dinosaur population up to near modern times.

Only a handful of reptile species exist today. The Gila monster is one example of a modern dinosaur surviving in relatively small numbers in Asia today. Like crocodiles and alligators, they require a warm climate. Snakes, turtles, and most lizards also prefer warmth. There is room to speculate that a few species may yet roam undiscovered and uncatalogued in remote places. It has long been speculated that the Loch Ness monster is some sort of plesiosaur and not just the imagination of some inebriated Scots.

Although we may not know the exact cause of dinosaur extinction, the fact that many species have become extinct presents its own set of problems for the theory of Evolution. In the modern age we see species becoming extinct every year, as we have for many decades. In all that time, we have never observed the spontaneous evolution of any new species. Of course we have seen minor adaptation and some mutation within the range of genetic variability of a given species, but there is not one single recorded case of the natural formation of an entirely new kind of organism through adaptation or mutation. The obvious problem is that kinds become extinct in nature but do not appear spontaneously as Darwinian theory predicts. There are more than five million genetically unique life forms alive today. Although new species are frequently discovered, discovery is far different from the idea of appearing through the process of Evolution. If Evolution were true, it would stand to reason based on the number of unique kinds existing now that the rate of new species development should outpace the rate of extinction. Instead, we observe several existing species going extinct every year and none appearing. This lopsided ratio fits the Creation model where no new kinds appear now although some kinds may become extinct. The Evolution model predicts an even or better ratio favoring appearance of new organisms.

32. Biological Anthropology

“And hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath determined the times before appointed, and the bounds of their habitation;” Acts 17:26 (KJV).

Anthropology is the study of humankind. As with so many other sciences, a great gulf exists between the approaches taken by those who believe in Evolution compared with those who believe in biblical Creation. Before we even begin to consider interpretations of the evidence, a more basic question deserves consideration. What is the objective of our study? Are only trying to discover how people lived in the past, or are we trying to build a case for our belief? Are we curious or have we already made up our minds and we merely seek to prove—or at least reconcile—our beliefs with the evidence at hand?

The biblical account is simple and clear. All humans alive today are descendants of one couple—Adam and Eve. One might also say all humans alive today descend from the sons of Noah and their wives. Both are valid statements based on scripture.

Evolution considers modern humans (homo-sapiens) to be the surviving branch of a group of hominids including descended from some common ancestor. At one time it was believed the other races, such as Neanderthal and Cro-Magnon, were pre-human forms descended from apes. Most serious Evolutionists today have abandoned this simplified view. Instead, Evolutionists generally agree that apes and pre-human races all descend from some common ancestor and not directly from one to the next. This paradigm shift in Evolutionary theory is required by the insurmountable problems with the traditional view. Rather than abandon Evolution as a faulty scientific theory, Evolutionists cling to their faith in naturalism by constantly changing the theory. In a sense this is perfectly legitimate science, but in another sense it is foolish to continue calling it the same thing when the theory has undergone such major overhaul over the years.

At the intersection of paleontology and anthropology we find ourselves digging up bones and trying to make sense of them. Much has been made of a relatively small pool of fossilized humans. Various names have been given to them such as Neanderthal, Cro-Magnon, and a range of homo-erectus family generally called “early man.” There are certain distinctions, but they are all within the range of modern human norms. The distinctions vary, but in each case they are superficial and easily explained by Creationists. In each case where a definite age is assigned to such remains, the age is arrived at by arbitrary means or, in the case of radiological dating, on the basis of assumptions previously shown to be doubtful.

Most modern museums are little more than temples dedicated to the worship of Evolution. Models fashioned for display are designed to convince the general public that these early people were a brutish lot with long arms and flat foreheads. Never mind that there’s really nothing odd at all about most bones from these people. Some do show evidence of disease, perhaps rickets or arthritis, but nothing so odd as gorilla arms or strangely shaped chests like those portrayed in typical museum displays. The biblical account offers the clue that many of those who lived before the great flood reached ages of several hundred years. Since no one today lives that long it is difficult to say with any great accuracy how great age would affect bone structure, but computer modeling suggests it would cause a certain amount of compression in parts of the skull including the jaw, face, and forehead. Neanderthal and Cro-Magnon are more likely to be remains of otherwise normal pre-deluvian elderly people.

Fossil remains of early humans, like many other creatures, are often found relatively close together. This suggests those early people lived in groups much the way we organize ourselves today into cities and towns. Perhaps the elderly or those with some disease lived in their own communities just as they do today.

Racism is the word we use to describe the ugly way people of one skin color act toward another. Slavery is an ancient institution. There were basically two types of slaves in the ancient world. There were those who willingly became servants, usually for a fixed period, much like contract employees for businesses today. Those captured in battle were often forced to serve as slaves. While there were class and sometimes cultural differences between slave and owner, the concept of “race” being a criteria for slavery is a relatively modern idea. European and American slavery of the 17th to 19th centuries was based on a form of trade. Rather than going to war for captives, the slavers traded goods to African tribal chiefs who sold out their own people for material riches. In a relatively short time people in the western world began to think of dark skin as a sign of slavery and light skin as a sign of freedom. Since the new slaves could not speak the European languages and had few skills deemed valuable by the Europeans, the black people were thought of as inferior by the average white person. An incredible evil spread across the earth as a result of this color-based class system.

Darwin attributed what he perceived to be racial differences—in fact racial superiority—to different stages of evolutionary development. The Africans brought to the New World as slaves were held in low esteem by their European masters long before Darwin’s began writing. We cannot blame slavery on Darwin. We can, however, see how racism was fueled by Darwinism. As long as men have walked the earth there have been those who felt superior and others made to feel inferior. What Darwin did provide was an enlightened scientific rationale for superiority based on genetic qualities. Darwin gave new life to racism in a world where slavery was being extinguished by people of faith on both sides of the Atlantic. The notion of racial superiority by virtue of being the most advanced in evolutionary development drove the horrors of eugenics experiments in America and Europe in the early twentieth century culminating in Hitler’s Aryan Race and the efforts to exterminate what he perceived to be inferior races. In the name of purification and advancement of the most superior humans, Hitler assigned the label of race to all sorts of nationalities, cultures and most infamously to Jews. Euthanasia, abortion, and other forms of genetic engineering are among the forms of eugenics practiced by the famous and infamous alike.

Skin color is a function of melanin. Skin color does not indicate nor cause any certain level of intelligence or evolutionary development. Skin color is one of several superficial forms of genetic diversity. The extra fat around the eyes of Oriental people, the hairy arms of the northern Europeans, and the strong foreheads of Aborigines are all the result of limiting the gene pool with time and distance. Mendel’s genetic theory of dominant and recessive genes provides an eloquent and scientifically well established explanation as to why people from different places look different. Ancient people groups became geographically isolated. As a result they produced qualities associated with their region. What does not make sense is to suggest the groups gained genetic information at different rates so that some, like white Europeans, were the most advanced while others, like Aborigines, failed to evolve as quickly. Quite the opposite is true. Characteristics like a limited range of skin color, eye color, or hair are the result of information loss associated with geographical isolation.

Regardless of skin color or culture, human is human. DNA evidence suggests all humans alive today can be traced to just a few and most likely one genetic Eve. Race, then, is a distinction which came some time later. Evolution suggests adaptation by natural selection. Natural selection has some merit when it comes to explaining characteristics associated with a geographical region or other environmental factors. The proper context for natural selection is reduction of genetic information by limited the pool of dominant or recessive genes. Natural selection does not explain formation of new genetic qualities to cope with new circumstances. There is no difference in the amount of genetic information between people of different races, only superficial differences in the diversity of content.

The bible indicates there were just eight people on the ark who repopulated the earth after the flood. The bible indicates they eventually spread out in different directions. Different climate, diet and other factors are known to cause superficial changes over several generations. Inbreeding within a group over a period of time also tends to reduce genetic variety and accentuate some traits over others, such as hair color, eye color or nose shape. The same concept applies to developing various breeds of other creatures like dogs, cats, cattle, and so forth. Often more variety of breeds are found in domestic animal species than in wild animals. Animal husbandry practiced by humans exercising dominion over domestic animals is the most likely reason. Evolution suggests a spectrum of breeds should exist of all animal species, even blurring to the point of eliminating barriers between species. Once again we find the predictions of the Creation model more accurately fit what we observe than do the predictions of the Evolution model.

33. Social Anthropology

“And the LORD said, ‘Behold, they are one people, and they have all one language, and this is only the beginning of what they will do. And nothing that they propose to do will now be impossible for them. Come, let us go down and there confuse their language, so that they may not understand one another's speech.’ So the LORD dispersed them from there over the face of all the earth, and they left off building the city.” Gen 11:6-8 (ESV)

The bible teaches that our planet is only a few thousand years old. It teaches that mankind has walked the earth since very nearly the start. It goes on to teach that mankind multiplied and covered the earth. The first humans sinned by rebelling against God. Their children, corrupt by sin, grew in their rebellion until God destroyed the world with a flood. Only a few humans and a sample of each air breathing animal kind were spared in order to repopulate the planet. The bible teaches that this took place about 1656 years after creation. “Recorded history” picks up shortly after the flood as the first few generations after the flood began to flourish. The bible records an event little more than a century after the flood in which God introduced a spectrum of languages and the immediate dispersion of people divided by their sudden inability to communicate. Most of the rest of the bible concerns itself primarily with God’s involvement with one specific people group through which God chose for His purpose to reveal Himself.

The bible is not the only record of ancient history. It is universally accepted that civilization as we currently know it, what we would call “recorded history,” sprang up suddenly roughly four thousand years ago. Diverse written language appears in cuneiform to glyphs to the western alphabet describing everything from mundane accounting records to genealogies to epic stories across the globe from Egypt to China to Western Europe.

There are stories of creation, patriarchs who lived unusually long lives, and a great flood in most cultures. Such myths have been documented in isolated tribes on Pacific islands and in South America discovered in the last two centuries. It has been suggested that early missionary visitors to some of these cultures have tainted these reports. The quantity, veracity, and even the unique differences found in these stories suggests there is more to them than merely similar mythology. Although in many cases the particulars differ from the biblical account, there are also striking similarities. Both similarities and differences tell us a great deal. Similarities suggest the more fundamental elements stem from a common history if not a common recollection of detail. Differences illustrate corruption of collective memory as it related by its many storytellers.

The most well known ancient flood myth is probably the Gilgamesh epic written within a few centuries of the Torah. Although the stories are superficially similar, the biblical account describes a ship that was actually sea worthy and capable of holding the cargo required. The ship described in the Gilgamesh epic would be impossible to keep afloat in the heavy seas of a violent open ocean. The Genesis flood account stands out as uniquely plausible compared with the myriad of other cultural flood myths.

Most origin myths contain a theme of pre-existing deity, formation of man from earth, and man having the purpose of managing the order of earthly things so that the gods can be about their own business. Anthropology takes into account a great deal more than written records. Anthropologists study a variety of historical phenomena from pyramids to cave writings.

The pyramids of Egypt are the most well known, but similar ancient structures exist on other continents from Asia to South America. The similarity of design suggests the design itself predates the division of language at Babel. The tower of Babel was probably some form of pyramid. After this the people who migrated to and settled Egypt built their own pyramids. Others built pyramid structures as far away as China. Those who settled Central America also built strikingly similar structures. They may have been Nabetian sailors or passengers on their ships who crossed the Pacific nearly 4000 years ago. The similarity of these designs makes it highly likely there was at least some contact at some point between these cultures long before widespread intercontinental travel is supposed to have taken place. Another common theme among pyramid style structures is similarity of purpose. These structures were usually associated with kings or deities for worship, sacred burial, or both. Another striking similarity is that the skills required for such architecture are highly specialized. Even today it is unclear how the ancients built these structures, even with huge labor forces. Most of these structures are believed to be thousands of years old with few if any constructed in the last two or three thousand years.

In evolutionary terms the pyramids present a strange puzzle. Pyramid construction requires a large and highly skilled labor force. It requires detailed plans, advanced engineering including mathematics and knowledge of physics, geology, and other physical sciences. Evolutionists generally suppose the skills employed by pyramid builders only recently evolved as the modern sciences rose out of the dark ages. What we observe is that the earliest societies were highly developed and possessed great skill. For reasons unexplained by Evolution, the skills fell into disuse and were lost with time only to be rediscovered as societies began working together for common progress.

The biblical text provides an explanation for the pyramid mystery that makes perfect sense. Just a few short generations after the flood the people were still living in close proximity. One man rose to power as the leader. He built a structure the bible calls a “tower.” The evidence of pyramid shaped structures around the world—towers—strongly suggests the biblical Tower of Babel was the first such pyramid. The bible indicates God caused languages to divide resulting in a complete breakdown of the building effort. It does not say God took the skills away, only that the whole of the human race could not work together on that tower. Based on the similarity of design and function in the many pyramids around the world, it seems clear that leaders of individual clans retained the knowledge long enough to pass along the skills to their descendants who built these other pyramids. Only those with the largest families and those strong enough to enslave others could build the pyramids. Egyptian technology was among the most advanced retained and added onto, although many other groups succeeded in building similar if somewhat smaller structures. In time populations grew and groups waged war for control of resources. In time these various cultures would become preoccupied with other efforts. Pyramid construction could not be maintained. The skills fell into disuse and were forgotten.

It is an historic fact that some people once lived in caves. A few still do. Evolutionists propose that the migration from caves to houses demonstrates evolution. They suppose societies and the complexity of their homes evolved with human knowledge. When you presuppose Evolution it makes perfect sense.

What does cave art actually prove? It proves little except that at least some people used caves for shelter and drew graffiti on the walls while they were there. Relatively few other artifacts have been found in caves. This suggests that the cave dwelling populations were small and probably did not stay in the caves for long periods. Caves provide excellent shelter from weather and wild beasts and in some cases they are good for storage. Caves tend to be too unpleasant for humans to live in long term. They tend to be cool, damp, and dark. On hunting expeditions, however, a cave could prove an ideal resting place for a brief stay. A well-hidden cave could also prove to make an ideal hiding place from an enemy.

The biblical account sheds some additional light on potential reasons for using caves as temporary dwellings. Genesis 11:1-9 records an event which may have occurred less than 150 years after the flood. The bible indicates at that point all humans spoke a common language and were mostly settled in one community. Together they attempted to build a tower to heaven. God intervened to stop the project. He did this by miraculously dividing languages so that the workers could not communicate. The bible indicates that the people dispersed. This is logical since the inability to communicate causes isolation and distrust. The strongest families were able to hold their ground and remain nearest to the area. Weaker families dispersed more quickly to seek out their own resources and put distance between themselves and stronger, more stable tribes. The weakest were constantly being pushed out. People on the move have little or no opportunity to build fixed structures. Until their numbers grew and they settled somewhere, these traveling tribes took shelter where ever they could find it. For reasons described above caves were ideal for short-term shelter.

The individuals or families who fled Babel took with whatever knowledge they had acquired prior to the event. Since they could not communicate effectively with one another, the knowledge they had is what they took with them. The same people who were driven furthest and fastest were probably also the most poorly equipped intellectually and technologically. Those who had the most knowledge would be most effectively capable of holding their ground. This is probably the most compelling explanation as to why Mesopotamia is considered the cradle of civilization and why many of the people groups furthest away, like some of the remote tribes in Africa, Asia, and the Americas are the least developed “native” peoples.

Evolution fails to explain division of language. The bible provides an answer. Evolution suggests man migrated out of caves as they developed. The bible explains why some people would have used caves as shelter as they migrated away from development. The Evolution model does not present any compelling explanation of the hundreds of languages spoken today, nor why language is often associated with social development. Diverse written language appears to have sprung up roughly 4000 years ago from Egypt to China. This seems to coincide with the relatively sudden and nearly simultaneous appearance of various civilizations across vast distances. Babel provides a better explanation of early anthropology than nearly any evolution-based theory ever put forward.

34. Sociology

“Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen.” Ro 1:24-25 (ESV)

The Creation model makes specific predictions about morality and moral standards. Even though moral laws did not become written code until the time of Moses, Genesis clearly indicates people knew right from wrong from the moment Adam ate the forbidden fruit.

Moses was probably not the first to legislate morality and he was certainly not the last. Mosaic law is unique in history for many reasons. Aside from technical and cultural differences, Mosaic law is most unique because the boundaries Moses set for Israel were given to him by God. The differences between human law and divinely given law are profound. For example, Mosaic law protected the weak from the strong. Women had legal protection and recourse for rape. Abuse of slaves, women, children, elderly and the poor was forbidden. Human sacrifice and in particular child sacrifice was explicitly forbidden. Many laws provided for the benefit of community health from washing to quarantine to meal preparation. Ceremonial and worship laws not only kept the people focussed on God, but also provided a strong sense of unity among a large and sprawling society.

God is not only Creator, He is the ultimate lawgiver. God gave Moses those laws as a gift to His chosen people. The purpose was not to burden the people, it was to help them. The Law reveals the righteous character of God. It is a gift of love. So then, why do men so often reject God’s law? God’s standards are holy and perfect because He is holy and perfect. Human nature is corrupt. Our darkness rejects the light of God. We seek to do our own will and satisfy our own desires. Our corrupt nature seeks to reject the perfect law because we know that in our corruption we can never be good enough to satisfy the perfect and holy requirements of God’s law. Just as many in ancient Israel rejected holy law, even after Jesus Christ succeeded in fulfilling the requirements of the law, we too seek ways to reject or ignore God’s law. We want to do what we want to do. We are selfish and self destructive by nature.

If it is difficult for those who believe in the Creator and the absolute standards He established for morality, consider what lengths those who do not believe will go to in order to throw off the oppressive yoke of law that prohibits all the things they love by nature. When the Creator is vanquished from society, the source of ultimate law and morality is vanquished. As people make God smaller, less important, less real, they can indulge their carnal desires with less restriction. By eliminating God completely, moral absolutes are eliminated completely.

There are those who would argue that the United States was not founded on Christian principles because our government is secular. These are often the most vocal opponents of Christianity and Christian principles. They seek to throw off the oppressive yoke of Christianity in every form precisely because scripture demands holiness and they do not want to be holy. The anti-Christian movement is made up of many factions and takes many forms. Some of these movements include those who support homosexuality, abortion, drunkenness, recreational drugs, pornography, animal rights, just to name a few. Any one of these sin cultures would be small on their own, but to gain power and legitimacy they band together in the name of “tolerance.” They are willing to tolerate each other as distinct factions, but they share a common enemy in Christ. The war they wage is not for land or money. The war is for minds and hearts.

In the name of “tolerance,” individual sin cultures seek to convince the general population and even Christians that they should be accepted. Holiness and sin cannot abide one another. The attacks come on many fronts, but the most effective are those attacks on the foundation of faith. By destroying faith in the first chapters of Genesis, the foundation of Christianity is destroyed. Such a statement may sound illogical, paranoid, delusional, or spiteful. After all, Jesus Christ is the basis of Christianity, not Genesis. Right?

It is from Genesis we discover God is the source of life and sin is the cause of death. From Genesis we learn of our purpose and place in nature. From Genesis we learn that we were meant to live in peace with God and nature. If not for human sin, we would not need a redeemer who can fully atone for our sin and give us hope for eternal life. When this foundation is removed, the purpose of life is removed. If humans evolved, they must have transitioned from prior animal forms. Death and the struggle to survive through natural selection, as described in the Evolution model, turns Genesis into a fable. There can be no absolute morality, no sin—original or otherwise—and no need for a savior. The work of Christ to atone for sin on the cross is rendered null and void. If his stated purpose in life and death and resurrection is false, his entire ministry must be a sham. By tossing out Genesis we can and indeed must dismiss everything else in the bible. At best the bible becomes a collection of stories about history. Ancient Israel becomes just another superstitious tribal culture who just happened to have a monotheistic superstition.

If God is who He claims to be—an omniscient, omnipotent, and omnipresent mind of pure holiness and love—then it stands to reason the revelation He gave to humanity must be true. We may not fully understand it and it may not be written in a popular modern language with “proper” scientific terms, but the information it does contain should be correct in all details. A broad range of views of the Creation account do not take the plain text at face value. After all, cycles of light and dark lasting 24 hours make no sense at all prior to the creation of the sun and establishment of our solar system. Right? But if God says that is how it happened, then perhaps the problem is not what God said, but maybe it is our lack of understanding. Later in this book we will consider theories explaining how three normal days could have passed with increasingly ordered cycles of light and dark until the sun was fully and finally formed. For now, suffice it to say there are logical explanations. The ultimate question is not answered by a technical detail—it is answered in your heart.

Regarding society as a whole, both origin models make various predictions. The question, as with each topic we consider, is which model better fits what we actually observe.

Evolution (Materialism) does not predict absolutes for morality. Law and morality are subject to the interpretation of those with power to establish and enforce standards. Although free will is not predicted, the will to survive is assumed in this model. For the sake of preservation and evolutionary advancement, laws should favor the fittest and allow the elimination of the least fit. Few if any other laws are needed. In fact, any system of establishing and administering justice is not predicted. The “fittest” should automatically be the ruling class and those less fit would be allowed to exist only to serve those more fit. Regardless of class, individuals should seek to preserve themselves and their immediate family at the cost of everything else. After meeting basic survival needs, individuals would seek to obtain whatever gives them pleasure and greater fitness.

The Creation model predicts moral absolutes. It predicts a sense of right and wrong within the minds of individuals. This internal sense of right and wrong is called “conscience.” It predicts altruism. It predicts awareness of nonmaterial reality and personal interaction with the Creator. It also predicts free will. It predicts a distinction between holiness and sin. If those in power choose holiness, they will obey the directives of the Creator and establish laws which are holy and just. If they exercise their free will to deny the Creator, they will tend to ignore their conscience and do what pleases their sin-nature instead of what pleases God. The former leads to a free society with justice for all people. The latter leads to despot rulers. Both types of societies can and do exist in our world today.

Although we see ample evidence of societies led by those who believe in the Evolution model, we do not see the Evolution model itself at work in any of those societies. Consider Nazi Germany. Hitler believed in racial superiority. He supported extensive eugenics experiments and he supported destruction of what he considered to be inferior races. In so doing, he exercised free will at every turn. Hitler was a master of propaganda. He appealed to the hearts and minds of his people. Millions of Germans went to war because they loved, trusted, and believed in Hitler, or in other cases were simply compelled and chose service over the alternative. If Evolution were true, it makes very little sense for so many to sacrifice so much.

Conversely, consider the efforts of Wilber Wilberforce in the early 19th century. He was privately a devout Christian. Although not physically well himself, he spent a substantial share of his wealth on care for the poor. He gave up on his personal dreams to serve in British Parliament with a burning desire to end what he felt was the grievously unjust slave trade. He toiled countless hours and risked his reputation and by some accounts his life in order to rescue untold thousands or even millions from slavery. His efforts were a model and a beacon that would fuel the American abolitionist movement and culminate in Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation. Neither Lincoln nor Wilberforce acted alone. Free will predicts some will seek evil while others will seek good. In both England and Britain slavery was a thriving business built on the capture and trade of other human beings. In both countries there were some who supported the trade and others who felt the practice was an abomination. The free will application of justice stands as strong evidence against Evolution.

35. Morality

“Then I considered all that my hands had done and the toil I had expended in doing it, and behold, all was vanity and a striving after wind, and there was nothing to be gained under the sun.” Eccl 2:11 (ESV)

Morality requires some sense of distinction between right and wrong behavior. We all have a natural sense of right and wrong, but where do our standards for right and wrong come from? Evolution suggests morality is simply biological programming developed as a necessary function to propagate the human species. If morality is reduced to biology, standards are necessarily relative to the individual or the individual’s group. The bible indicates that there are absolute standards for moral behavior applicable universally. The creation account provides a very clear description of how we came into the original knowledge of good and evil. The rest of scripture describes the history of the relationship between a holy and righteous God and humanity made corrupt by its knowledge of good and evil.

From the Evolutionist’s perspective the terms right and wrong, with respect to morality, generally refer to correct or incorrect behavior for the individual in the context of the immediate situation. It is from this point of view that situational ethics are defended. The terms good and evil are strongly disliked by Evolutionists because those terms are understood to imply absolutes derived from something besides material reality. The bible lays out a clear foundation for universal justice with a distinct difference between good and evil. Good is that which conforms to the nature of God and includes behaviors consistent with God’s character. That would be love, forgiveness, mercy, grace, creativity, justice, and full truthful disclosure. Evil is that which rebels God’s nature and includes idolatry, accusation, destructiveness, deception, lying, sadism, and the opposites of all good character. Faith in Evolution requires faith that there is no God therefore it must deny objective truth and moral absolutes. Faith in the biblical Creation account necessarily includes faith in the existence of a Creator and with that comes belief in objective truth and absolute standards for and existence of good and evil.

The objective of the rest of this chapter is to describe the impact of belief in Evolution on society. Decide for yourself which is better: Evolution’s moral relativism or biblical objective morality.

Evolutionary morality is based on good or bad biology rather than good or bad behavior. Abortion and euthanasia become acceptable because weakness is viewed as evil. Those who cannot contribute or who are otherwise a burden have less value and are more easily discarded. Convenience of the fit and desirable trumps life for the weak or unwanted. The bible forbids discarding life casually and goes so far as to require us to do all we can to help those who cannot help themselves.

Evolution draws no moral distinction between human life and animal life. Relativism allows some to be cruel toward animals because life in general has no intrinsic value. The same relativism causes others to view animals as equivalent to humans. Both extremes are wrong when viewed from the Biblical perspective. God endowed both humans and animals with souls, but humans alone were created in God’s image. God made man distinct from animals and gave him the job of stewardship. Biblical dominion does not mean cruelty or neglect. Those who consider animals equal to man lobby for animal rights arguing moral and civil equivalence. Relativism results in two extremes who fight one another.

If evolution is true, then it is ongoing. If it is ongoing, then it stands to reasons some humans are more highly developed than others. In other words, some people are more human than others. This idea is central to racism. It was the context Hitler used to condemn Jews and other undesirables. A branch of science called eugenics deals directly with purposefully driving human evolution. Hitler was obsessed with the idea of a master race. This idea came directly from a fundamental belief in Evolution. Evolutionary belief has likewise fueled the fires of racism in the United States. In Australia, the native Aborigines were thought to be a subhuman missing evolutionary link. They were hunted down and murdered with state sanctioned support. In reality their physical differences are entirely superficial. Likewise, the Pygmies of central Africa are just as human as anyone else, but due to their social and genetic isolation their appearance and culture is recessive. Many supporters of Evolution promote racism because they have bought into the lie that they really are superior. Rather than Evolution making them superior, isolation has led to restricting the gene pool of small groups like the aborigines and pygmies until diversity is lost and they begin to take on certain superficial characteristic differences from “normal” society. No group evolved to become superior. Instead, isolated groups lost genetic diversity until they looked different.

Racism and bigotry are not identical. A bigot may dislike another because of skin color, but a racist believes he is superior because of his skin color. Certainly slavery, along with bigotry and racism, existed before Darwin ever set sail. That said, Evolution lent a degree of legitimacy to it. Evolutionary morality can rationalize putting inferior races to work to serve superior races. Although the bible does not forbid slavery, it makes no room for any such thing as racial superiority. It took the will of determined Christians to abolish slavery of black people in the Americas.

Sexual deviance covers a number of acts including homosexuality, pedophilia, incest, rape, bestiality, and adultery. When the barriers of moral absolutes are removed, whatever form of pleasure a person desires becomes permissible to indulge in. God established standards for sexual behavior. He commanded humanity to go forth and multiply. Most of the forms of deviancy mentioned here run counter to procreation and the rest are destructive to human relationships and personal health.

After the fall, one of the first things Adam and Eve realized was their nakedness. In their shame they sought to cover themselves. When moral relativism replaces right and wrong, the human conscience gets seared away. Shame ceases to hold us back. Today we have a thriving pornography industry, sex on TV, and bikinis serving hot wings at family restaurants. Evolution gives us an excuse to go naked and a reason to take advantage of it. The bible encourages modesty, chastity, and purity. When society gets naked there should be no wonder why so many children get pregnant in middle school and all other forms of sexual deviancy are so widely accepted.

Evolution quietly attracts people away from belief in God. It is a powerful propaganda weapon in the war against marriage. Marriage and traditional family are under attack precisely because they are established by God. God created the institution of marriage in order to construct the best possible environment to raise healthy children. The homosexual movement strives to convince the general population that their behavior is acceptable and they have a right to choose their sexual behavior. Once homosexual rights are established, the next step is to redefine marriage. By opening up marriage to relationships other than one man and one woman, marriage looses its value and ceases to have meaning. The only reason to redefine marriage is to destroy it. Men and women are created with unique and special roles. The confusion of these roles is only to be expected when all standards erode in the chaos of relativism. The collapse of family follows closely.

The bible teaches that God is love. To have God’s love is to seek the benefit others above self. When we eliminate God from our lives, we deny ourselves the joy and benefits of having and sharing God’s love. Godless Evolutionary morality excuses and even encourages selfishness. We prefer to indulge our own interests above those of other family members. Selfishness of a husband or wife replaces love for the spouse. Selfishness of parents replaces love of children. Sin steals parents from their children. When parents submit to no authority except themselves, it is only natural that the children mimic this behavior and rebel against authority. When children feel unloved by their parents it becomes much easier to justify ridding yourself of a child you do not want. Abortion is justified for the sake of personal convenience and we call it a woman’s right to choose.

The bible says parents are to set proper boundaries, teach their children, encourage them, and lead by example. Children are to honor and obey parents. It is natural for teenagers and young adults to assert their independence. It is far more likely to turn into rebellion when the child is taught that objective moral absolutes do not exist. Children need boundaries for safety and security. Without any reason to recognize boundaries youth often become depressed and suicidal. Others become defiant and openly rebellious. Evolution destroys the foundation for the objective boundaries and sound reasoning needed by young minds.

There are consequences when you try to disregard the laws of physics. Likewise there are consequences when you ignore moral laws established by God. Belief in Evolution is deceptive because Evolution cannot be held directly responsible for any of the forms of lawlessness mentioned above. Yet, Evolution teaches atheism. When God becomes a fairytale, so do the standards that God established for our benefit. Refusal to accept God’s laws eliminates neither the law nor the consequences. It only eliminates our ability to see where we went wrong.

36. Education

“My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge: because thou hast rejected knowledge, I will also reject thee, that thou shalt be no priest to me: seeing thou hast forgotten the law of thy God, I will also forget thy children.” Hos 4:6 (KJV)

All human life is precious, but most people agree that the most precious of all are the children. They are our future. Whoever controls education controls the children and thus the future.

In most public schools and universities in the US and other western countries Evolution is simply assumed as fact. Students are indoctrinated from an early age with the idea that they are the product of chance. From there it is a short step to the conclusion that life is brief and meaningless that faith in the supernatural is naïve at best and potentially very dangerous. Evolution is mandated in most state education curricula for graduation from high school.

Descent is not tolerated among instructors. An instructor is likely to be removed from the class for openly questioning the state religion: Evolution. Schools, particularly at the college level, are supposed to be places where ideas are freely exchanged and examined. It most schools the free exchange of ideas is limited to those ideas deemed politically correct. This includes a range of topics from politically conservative ideas to traditional family values to personal morality. No topic is more politically incorrect, particularly in the science wing, than Creation. The very mention of any legitimacy to the idea of “intelligent design” is deemed heretical and is subject to censure. Evolution is the only view allowed.

Why is intelligent design forbidden in the classroom? It questions materialism. It questions Darwinism. It opens the door to the possibility that there is more to reality than what our natural senses can detect. Any idea worth having should be able to withstand scrutiny. Evolutionists do not want the object of their faith scrutinized. Christians, on the other hand, scrutinize their faith at great length only to find the application of sound reasoning only serve to support their faith. If Evolution were true, its supporters should fearlessly encourage its scrutiny. The opposite is true. When facts are countered, the debate quickly turns to outright dismissiveness, ad homonym attacks, or misdirection. The truth liberates. Lies capture and enslave. Evolution is a lie born of darkness, so it cannot withstand the light of truth.

If Evolution is such a fantastic lie, why is it so successfully fooling so many people? Ultimately it seduces with the lie that there is no God, thus no such thing as good and evil, thus we are free of boundaries. Evolution says we are free to act as we see fit without eternal consequence. These lies are the end objective, but the initial seduction is far less obvious. Evolution provides all the elements of high drama. It is an epic story covering vast time. It features an intense struggle to rise up, death and conquest, chance, and ultimate progress toward victory. Beyond the so-called facts of evolution presented in classrooms, the theory itself is often dressed in the psychological negligée of romantic philosophy. Evolution is highly compelling when presented by a true believer in love with it.

Evolution is a philosophy, not science. It is a premise predicated on antiquated assumptions that alleviate a guilty conscience while simultaneously condemning that mind to error. Scientific facts stand up for themselves without regard to Evolution or Creation theory. In the classroom, however, only those facts are presented which appear to support the dogmatic philosophy of Evolution. Facts presenting a problem are generally ignored where possible and explained away with unscientific philosophy where they cannot be so easily ignored.

Rather than objectively analyzing the meaning of facts, Evolutionists use mountains of details then smugly state that the great weight of all those details support their faith. Facts, details, and evidence are real, Evidence is not the problem. The problem is interpretation. How we interpret the data depends on our initial belief. If we believe in Evolution we interpret the data in terms of Evolution. Conflicts are discarded or left to others to overcome. Creation is also a belief. As with Evolution, Creationists approach data and analyze it from their predisposed position. Like Evolutionists, when a Creationist is confronted with a conflict, they remain faithful to their belief and often either ignore or pass along the conflict to someone else to solve. It is intellectually dishonest for either side to claim the moral high ground. It is all the more ironic for Evolutionists to dishonestly claim the moral high ground since they generally refute the notion of moral absolutes.

Ethics and morality are increasingly becoming forbidden subjects in public schools and universities. The highest ethical morality in this brave new world is tolerance, so long as it only tolerates ideas which conform to materialism. Any honest study of ethics and morality requires the question of their source. Like the question of the ultimate source of material reality, the question of the ultimate source of immaterial things like morality is also forbidden. Scripture provides answers. Its truth sets us free from bondage to half-truths and outright lies. It points to a Creator who loves us, who reveals our sin and forgives us. Through Evolution we are told we can be free because there is no God so there is no sin and no need to be forgiven. Evolution denies the Creator. It creates nothing but a prison to prevent you from seeking and finding the truth. Jesus said he was the truth (Jn 14:6). Jesus also said if we knew him we would know the Father (Jn 8:19). Jesus also said the prison of hell could not prevent the Truth from entering in and setting the captives free (Mt 16:18-19, Jn 8:32). If we want truth, we need Jesus Christ (Jn 18:38).

37. Pragmatism

“But I have heard that you can give interpretations and solve problems. Now if you can read the writing and make known to me its interpretation, you shall be clothed with purple and have a chain of gold around your neck and shall be the third ruler in the kingdom.” Dan 5:16 (ESV)

Problem solving skills are among the most sought after by any employer. As individuals we higher plumbers to solve plumbing problems. Corporations hire consultants to solve difficult business problems. Engineers and technicians do almost nothing but solve problems. We seek out doctors to solve problems. Pragmatism the acid test for the Evolution and Creation models. If either is impractical and counterproductive it should be discarded. If one solves problems, it has merit.

Engineers use various design principles to solve problems. Good engineering accounts for all the variables and leaves nothing to chance. Creation credits the order of the universe to an intelligent designer who took all the variables into account. Evolution credits the order of the universe to chance and good fortune. Hope is placed in the unlikely notion that chaos spontaneously produces order. What we actually observe in nature is entropy. Left alone, any natural system will produce entropy until eventually all order moves to disorder. Evolutionary engineering is at best an oxymoron. Creative engineering is much more useful.

How we value life determines how we care for our fellow man. Evolution’s approach seeks to continually strengthen the race. This philosophy leads to a culture of death. Weak, handicapped, or otherwise unproductive or undesirable people do not strengthen the race. Euthanasia becomes the most efficient way to purify society and eliminate genetic flaws. This philosophy brought about the eugenics experiments of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Eugenics is the term for self-directed human evolution. Hitler’s ideal of a superior race led to the most horrible racial genocide of all time as part of Nazi eugenics. Margaret Sanger’s goal of aborting African American and other undesirable children though Planned Parenthood is an example of American eugenics. Ironically, the people who cry the loudest in public about racism are often the same ones promoting legalized euthanasia of the aged and infirmed, abortion, and other forms of medical treatment which values the state above the individual. From the biblical perspective all human life is intrinsically valuable. Humans are all created in the likeness of our Creator. We are to care for those who cannot care for themselves. We are to be generous and loving. Care for the individual is more important than satisfying an impersonal bureaucracy. The medical establishment should exist to improve the quality of life of individual people. When the medical establishment is forced to serve the state rather than the people, the caregivers are forced to care about the state’s wishes above those of the patients. The philosophy of eugenics requires that needs of the group, which in practical terms means the state, come before the needs of individuals. The biblical perspective protects individuals.

Biological research is conducted for one of two ultimate purposes. One ultimate purpose is to make human biology “better”—a form of eugenics. The other is to restore biology to “normal”—corrective medicine. Eugenics supposes Evolution because it supposes improvement is not only possible but also the highest possible objective of biological research. Corrective medical research focuses on overcoming diseases and disorders. Assuming normal biology is already ideal allows researchers to approach cures as engineering problems where the goal is to restore the normal. This assumption presupposes that normal is the designed condition. All sorts of maladies have been cured through this approach. Very little useful knowledge has been gained from the eugenics approach.

Psychiatry and Psychology are closely related branches of medicine used to cure mental illness. Looking at the mind as if it were purely biological almost always leads to a pharmacological approach to curing mental illness. There certainly are some very real biological problems with the brain that can be addressed with medications. However, there are many more mental conditions that require a non-material approach. Laughter, placeboes, and mental training to overcome phobias are just a few examples of non-material solutions. Refer back to Chapter 7 for more information about the mind and brain.

Anthropology is the study of man. It generally involves examination of the remains of previous civilizations. Studying ancient artifacts alone provides us with only a very limited understanding of history. The evolutionary approach allows all sorts of wild speculation and little meaningful explanation. Evolutionary anthropology fails to explain strikingly similar flood mythologies or pyramid construction among seemingly unrelated people groups of diverse language and distant location. The revelation of Genesis, on the other hand, provides startlingly clear, cogent, and accurate descriptions of history and historical context that explain many such mysteries in anthropology.

Geology is a very broad natural science that deals with nearly anything non-living in or on the earth. The Evolutionary uniformitarian model predicts conditions that simply do not fit the facts. A planetary flood far better explains the break up of Pangea as well as the formation of vast oil, coal, and fossil rich sedimentary rock. Geologic phenomena from the motion of tectonic plates to ocean chemical content to earth’s immense yet collapsing magnetic field fit far better the Creation model than the Evolution model. Dogmatically accepting Evolution requires untenable explanations.

People have looked at the sky in awe and wonder for as long as they have walked the earth. Our understanding of how celestial bodies interact depends on the model we use to try and grasp what we observe. As with any branch of science, erroneous theories lead to impossible experiments which in turn result in unexpected or meaningless results. Relativity experiments prove beyond reasonable doubt that the universe is or has expanded. By essentially disproving the steady state theory, the notion of an infinite past must be dismissed. The universe had a beginning. Evolution’s associate, the Big Bang Theory, fails to explain the prime cause of material reality. Creationists and Evolutionists alike have put forward a host of competing and often poorly founded theories. There is simply too much we do not know about our universe. What we do know is that sifting through the theories that rise up requires great skill and objectivity. We must not stifle theories simply because they do not fit a certain predisposition and we must not hold fast to those theories that fail under scrutiny even when the failed theory supports whichever position you hold.

Classical physics, like chemistry, provides us with very practical understanding of our world. Classical physics and chemistry are sciences that allow us to engineer things from the internal combustion engine to bridges to airplanes. While this level of physics is very practical to our day to day world, when we begin to look at nuclear and sub-nuclear matter we begin to reveal qualities far more curious and miraculous. The old law that two things cannot exist in the same place at the same time is false at the subatomic level. We now know that light is both energy and matter. The more we learn, the more amazingly designed the universe seems to be. To assume Evolution is to suspend belief in hard observation because Evolution necessarily denies Entropy. Few laws of science are as well established as Entropy. Evolution predicts simplicity. Creation predicts far greater complexity than meets the eye.

The useful outcome of science is technology. We study the material universe and what we learn allows us to construct more useful products. Could anyone have designed an MRI to find and treat cancer without several sciences working in concert? Technology resulting from science can help us to save lives, but it cannot answer the question: why should life be preserved? For that we must go beyond science and materialism to seek the divine.

Physical laws are absolute. Gravity, electrical charge, motion, magnetism and so forth have known characteristics that simply do not change. We call those characteristics physical laws. To suppose these physical laws arose from nothing is absurd, yet that is exactly what Materialism supposes. If caused, there must be an all-powerful self-existent eternal mind behind the design and implementation of the universe. That mind is called God. Morality is a sort of non-material code of law that governs human behavior. This code is based on the knowledge of good and evil. If God does not exist then good does not exist so evil cannot exist either. If there is no good and evil then there is no right and wrong. Morality is then at best an illusion that keeps the general population from destroying itself and at worst a hindrance to personal desires. If there is no God then there are certainly no absolutes when it comes to morality. If there is a God who established absolute physical laws there might also be absolute moral laws. If that is true then it stands to reason we should seek that God and learn His moral law with as much zeal as we seek to learn His physical laws. As a practical matter, without some sense of moral law, civil law becomes pointless and behavioral boundaries are not necessary. If there is moral law, then it stands to reason there must be some sort of objective standard. If that is true, it then makes sense to establish civil laws, civil rights, and mechanisms to administer justice. The very existence of government, whether personal or national, is predicted by Creation, however the absence of government is predicted by Evolution.

38. Common Genesis Objections

“Now who is there to harm you if you are zealous for what is good? But even if you should suffer for righteousness' sake, you will be blessed. Have no fear of them, nor be troubled, but in your hearts honor Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and respect, having a good conscience, so that, when you are slandered, those who revile your good behavior in Christ may be put to shame.” 1 Pe 3:13-16 (ESV)

The forces of logic and reason do not easily prevail against well entrenched beliefs (or disbeliefs). Previous chapters have demonstrated that we are more than our biology, that the earth is relatively young, that Evolution and entropy are at odds, and a myriad of other facts supporting the assertions of scripture. After objectively examining both the Creation and Evolution models in detail it seems difficult to dismiss scripture as merely the rambling of superstitious farmers from the distant past. However, as also discussed in previous chapters, Evolution is not simply a theory to be analyzed and tested. It is a deeply held belief system. Beliefs are always thought—by the believer—to be rational whether they are or not. The determined Christian will hold to his faith no matter how irrational it may seem. Likewise, the determined Evolutionist will hold onto his faith no matter how irrational it may seem. There is one stark difference. The Christian is not limited to human logic or materialism. The Evolutionist stakes his or her claim of faith on both. It is usually when flaws in Evolution are pointed out that the Evolutionist starts raising objections to the Genesis account.

The first and most obvious objection to Genesis is the assertion that the earth is only a few thousand years old. This objection has been dealt with at considerable length in previous chapters, however for the sake of discussion it is worth review. The decay of earth’s magnetic field, the shape and distribution of continents, radiohalides, ocean chemistry, solar characteristics, and various other physical evidence has been presented to support the biblical claim of a relatively young earth and to contradict Evolution’s demand for great ages of time.

The next major objection is the biblical flood. This, too, has been the subject of several earlier chapters. Major physical evidence of the flood appears in the geologic record and includes the fossil record. Evolution forbids a recent global flood catastrophe, however the physical evidence indicates hydraulic catastrophe has visited most if not all of the planet surface. With evidence of relative earth age and water catastrophe shown to support the biblical account, less significant objections are now to be dealt with.

One of the objections raised by Evolutionists is the idea of Noah’s ark having the capacity required for the number of animals it must have held. The dimensions of the ark rival the capacity of some of the largest ocean liners ever built. The capacity of the ark was equal to hundreds of railroad boxcars. The median size of all air breathing creatures possibly alive at the time would be roughly equal to a sheep. One boxcar can easily hold more than fifty sheep. It was divided into decks with stalls and food storage areas. The logistics feeding and caring for that many animals staggers the imagination. The account in Genesis, although brief, provides us with enough information to understand that God intervened supernaturally in various ways to make the ark work as a habitat for the people and the animals alike. The size and shape of the ark were more than adequate without additional supernatural assistance.

Genesis claims that the first several generations of humans enjoyed life spans up to 10 times longer than those reached by modern man. These ages are often dismissed as fairy tails. Entropy is one reason to predict shorter lives over time, but the main factor is probably climate change. The biblical account provides only limited information, but it does suggest a very different water cycle from what we see today. It is likely that much less radiation reached ground level. A number of other climate-related factors may have also contributed to the greater longevity.

The bible says that God created Adam and Eve as the first generation of humans. It makes no provision for the existence of any other people. This means that the second generation could only have produced a third generation if siblings married. Opponents of scripture are quick to point to the prohibitions of sibling marriage in the laws of Moses, such as Lev 18:11. If God forbids incest between brother and sister, then where did Seth and Cain get their wives? This would not have been a problem for Seth or Cain for several reasons. First, the gene pool was both small and untainted by mutations in previous generations. Their children would not have been plagued by the same genetic problems often encountered with the children of incest today. For another, the command to “go forth and multiply” was of prime importance. For another, there were no other choices. Only eight people survived the flood on the ark. Three couples (the three sons of Noah and their wives) are credited in scripture with repopulating the earth. Their children would have had to marry either siblings or first cousins. In very ancient cultures we know that brothers would marry sisters to maintain “purity” of the bloodlines of their kings. When the taboo against incest was put against the taboo of impurity or failure to reproduce, the demand to bare children took priority over concern about how genetically close the couple was. Finally, the first biblical objections to sibling sexual relations are seen in Abraham’s time and the first formal law against sibling incest was not codified until after the Exodus. It is entirely reasonable to conclude that laws against sibling incest were put into place much later and for practical reasons which were not problematic for the earliest humans.

Biblical genealogies are used to calculate the approximate age of the earth. The strongest complaints against scripture are often the supposed contradictions. Within theological circles, even among the strongest believers in the literal account, there are disagreements about how to properly calculate the earth’s age. There are a few areas of contention used to try and invalidate scripture. One involves minor discrepancies between the New Testament genealogies (Mt 1:1-17 and Lk 3:27-38). A second involves how ages of patriarchs are translated. A third relates to the dating of key events and the periods between them.

It is true that the genealogies in Matthew and Luke are not identical. In fact they are very different. The fact they run in a different order is insignificant, as is the fact Matthew begins with Abraham whereas Luke goes all the way to Adam. The major difference takes place in the route from David to Jesus. Matthew’s list concentrates on the royal lineage route. Luke’s list provides additional details and appears to concentrate more on the genetic lineage. Perhaps the greatest difficulty is the giving of different names for Joseph’s father. There are various answers possible. First, Joseph may have been adopted or his mother may have remarried. In either case his physical father may be in one list and his adoptive father in the other. It could be that one lists a literal father while the other lists a recent ancestor such as a literal grandfather, particularly if the literal father died and the grandfather raised Joseph. Some propose that one list actually gives Mary’s lineage and the other Joseph’s, although the text does not easily lend itself to this sort of reading. Either way it is easily possible to have two distinct genealogical routes dividing after David then converging again at Jesus. Whatever the case, technical questions about the New Testament genealogies are actually minor at best.

Most New Testament quotations of the Old Testament appear to be taken from an earlier Greek translation known as the Septuagint. There are significant problems with the Septuagint itself. Several ages and names were incorrectly translated into Greek. Those early Jewish translators were seeking to make the Word of God available to the people in the common language and were more concerned with making it readable than with its accuracy. It is worth noting that the Septuagint was translated fairly rapidly by a team of seventy (hence the name) in a time when Greek culture was overwhelming Jewish society. With the discovery and publication of the Dead Sea Scrolls we now know that the Mesoratic Hebrew text is a far more reliable original resource for translation than the Septuagint. The early church did not have the luxury of a widely available original Hebrew language text. St. Jerome is credited with translating the Septuagint into Latin to produce the text known as the Vulgate. This third translation introduced many more errors. Unfortunately the Septuagint or worse yet, the Vulgate, have served as original source material for various later translations into common language bibles. When selecting an English bible it is always best to choose one translated from the original languages (Hebrew Old Testament and Greek New Testament). It is also only fair to note that a few passages, most notably part of Daniel, appear to have been written originally in a third language, Aramaic. The point of all this is to explain that discrepancies in certain genealogical information, including numerical values (ages or lengths of time), are due to translation difficulties and particularly the fact that the Apostles relied on the Septuagint as their source of Old Testament scripture. The problem isn’t that a name or two got omitted or spelled differently, it is a wonder that the lists survived as well as they did over thousands of years to reach us with so few variations.

The bible provides us with very specific dates making it relatively easy to calculate the years from Creation to the present. The flood took place about 1656 years after Creation. Abraham was born about 1948 years after Creation. Jacob’s family entered Egypt about 2217 years after Creation. There is some question as to whether Israel remained in Egypt for 400 years or whether it was actually 400 years from the prophecy given to Abraham until the Exodus. Although is more widely believed that Israel was in Egypt the entire 400 years, there is strong biblical support for dating the alternative. The difference is nearly two centuries. Either way, we know David ruled from about 1010 BC to about 970 BC. The bible provides us with enough detail to calculate that the Exodus took place about 1446 BC. Working backward from this point, the Exodus took place either about 2617 or 2448 years after Creation. This places Creation as late as about 3794 BC to as early as 4063 BC. As of 2009 the earth is roughly 5800 to 6100 years old.

The modern Jewish calendar, the official calendar of Israel, reckons the year to be 5770 (as of Rosh Hashanah 2009). This figure is very close the lower age calculated above and could even be more accurate. It is not known for sure when Jews began to count years by this method since the bible itself does not count time this way. It is known, however, that the Jews are not the only ones who counted time since Creation. Some western European genealogies of kings recorded centuries before Christianity include years numbered from Creation, even naming biblical figures like Japheth, Noah, and in some cases some earlier patriarchs as far back as Adam. The exact age of the earth is not nearly as important as the fact that our planet is quite young. Either scripture is a recording of God’s gift of revelation and relationship to and with mankind or it is little more than a collection of stories handed down through one obscure ancient tribe.

The following is a chart of dates from Creation to Israel’s entry to Egypt. The dating of the Exodus relative to Israel entering Egypt (at the end of this chart) is debated, but is at most 430 years and at least 194 years. The date of the Exodus is reasonably well established in the mid-fifteenth century BC.

Certainly this chapter fails to capture the whole of the objections to the biblical claim to the age of the earth, let alone scripture generally. There are many fine books in print offering well reasoned explanations for the many objections to scripture and it is to these I would direct you for more information on the subject.

39. Christianity and Creation

“And you, who once were alienated and hostile in mind, doing evil deeds, he has now reconciled in his body of flesh by his death, in order to present you holy and blameless and above reproach before him, if indeed you continue in the faith, stable and steadfast, not shifting from the hope of the gospel that you heard, which has been proclaimed in all creation under heaven, and of which I, Paul, became a minister.” Col 1:21-23 (ESV)

Evolution says death came before sin. Genesis says sin came before and was the cause of death. Why did Jesus die and why was he able to defeat death and offer eternal life if sin isn’t the reason for death and sinlessness the reason for life? If death existed before sin, then Jesus is a liar and should not be believed. What is the nature of faith and why should Jesus be believed?

Paul recounts the essence of the very earliest of Christian creeds in 1 Cor 15:1-8 when he explains Jesus Christ died for sin and rose the third day according to the prophecies of scripture and was seen alive by many eye witnesses. Either these things happened or they did not. There are many arguments made against it, but ultimately the power of personal eye witness testimony and the supporting evidence of and from history are steadfast. The faith of a born again Christian is supported by reason, but strictly speaking not caused by it. Saving faith is spiritual. It must be experienced personally. Faith transcends intellect. Experience transcends knowledge. To be born again is to experience the forgiveness of sin. This is done not by human action or mental choice, but by a divine act carried out by the forgiver, Jesus Christ.

Paul writes in the fifth chapter of Roman that sin came into the world through Adam and death through sin. He then explains that just as death came about because of one man, forgiveness of sin comes through Jesus Christ because he, who was sinless, died on behalf of sinners to pay the debt of sin. Either sin caused death or it did not. If sin is not the cause of death then the sinlessness of Jesus is meaningless. Evolution requires death before sin. This belief directly opposes the New Testament, not just the first chapters of Genesis. Understanding Genesis is not required. Faith in Jesus Christ is required for eternal life.

The new and old testaments alike warn against false teaching. The new testament in particular makes a number of very direct statements about the dangers of false beliefs and those who promote them. Peter perhaps spoke most clearly against the belief we call Evolution when he wrote, “…scoffers will come in the last days with scoffing, following their own sinful desires.They will say, “Where is the promise of his coming? For ever since the fathers fell asleep, all things are continuing as they were from the beginning of creation.” (2 Pe 3:3-4, ESV)

Christians need to remember that Evolution is a theory. A theory is an unproven belief. Evolution is also a human idea. Christianity is founded on the testimony of people who were eyewitnesses of the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Although we cannot be eyewitnesses of these events in the same way as the Apostles, we have their written testimony and we have it from several of them. They testify that our Lord Jesus referred to the creation account at various times as an historical fact. Jesus is Lord or he is a liar.

Evolution offers one explanation for history. The bible offers another. Science does not decide which is true. All science can do is examine material reality to quantify and describe its qualities. Science is merely a technique, not a conclusion. Creationists and Evolutionists both have the same evidence to work with. The evidence available may be tested scientifically, but meaning is interpreted within the framework of whatever belief is held by the examiner.

The Evolution model on the premise that life itself is devoid of special purpose. The earth is nowhere special. Humans are one of many life forms evolved from primordial goop and are not particularly special among those many organisms except for certain characteristics suggesting we are “more” (or at least differently) evolved than other creatures. Free will is an illusion as is any idea that we are more than our biology. Humans are among the most recent organisms to evolve. Every living thing dies and the cycle of life and death has been going on since the first organisms formed. Life is a struggle to continually evolve and our ultimate end is death. Law and justice are useful concepts in the evolution of society although they are not intrinsically necessary nor are they objectively absolute.

The Creation model is built on the premise of divine purpose. God designed the material universe from subatomic particles to galactic clusters with exacting standards. God created order—order can no more create itself than material reality could create itself. Reality consists of more than the material universe. God created humans as part biology and part spirit. Our likeness to God can be seen in our spiritual nature. This includes our creativity, morality, humor, altruism, and various other characteristics we attribute to God as well as human kind. We have purpose and the free will to accept or turn from that purpose. Man was designed for life, but death came upon man through sin. Eternal life is the gift God seeks to give to all who will seek Him, accept His love and repent of their sin.

Even without benefit of scripture, a reasonable objective survey of the natural world leads to the conclusion that there must be some sort of intelligent designer. This designer must be responsible for establishing cosmic order and development of life as we currently have it. This mind must be unrestrained by time or material reality yet must be capable of manipulating both. The Apostle Paul essentially said the same thing in the context of the opening chapters of his letter to the Romans. It stands to reason, then, that if we recognize such a designer exists, that designer must still exist and could be knowable. The bible claims to reveal God to humanity. Through the bible we may begin to get to know the designer, the one Christians call Creator.

The bible says the earth and everything in it was created in six days. Although the length of the creative days in Genesis cannot be proven to be exactly 24 hours each, scripture leaves little room for any other interpretation. Each Creative day is described as one cycle of dark and light in immediate succession. In other words, the text does not leave room to insert additional periods of time between one day and another. It requires substantial mental and linguistic gymnastics to read into the creative days anything other than literal successive single dark/light cycles.

A plain and literal reading of the creation account of Genesis 1 is supported throughout scripture. The strongest support is found in the ten commandments recorded in Ex 20. The fourth commandment instructs the people to keep the Sabbath holy because: “For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day. Therefore the LORD blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.” (Ex 20:11, ESV). A similar explanation for the Sabbath commandment is repeated in Ex 31:17. There are many other references directly or indirectly supporting the Creation account throughout the Old Testament.

Jesus confirmed the Creation account of Genesis with words and deeds. According to John’s gospel account the first public miracle Jesus performed was the creative act of turning water into wine (Jn 2:1-11). John proclaims that Jesus is the creative Word of God (Jn 1:1-3,14) through whom God created everything. In Mk 13:19 Jesus remarks that God created everything. In Mt 19:4-6 Jesus affirms that God created the first humans male and female and established that the purpose was to form a family unit. Jesus speaks of Abel as a real person in Lk 11:51. Jesus confirms the historical fact of the flood of Noah in Mt 24:37-38. Jesus also talked about Abraham as a real historical figure in Jn 8:56-58. More generally, Jesus validated the books attributed to Moses because Moses wrote about him (Jn 5:45-46). Jesus told Nicodemus that if he could not accept what Jesus said about earthly things, how could accept what Jesus said about spiritual things (Jn 3:12). Only through willful ignorance can we ignore what Jesus had to say about the accuracy of Genesis and the other books of Moses, including the factual nature of Creation.

The Apostles spoke of the Creation account directly and indirectly. Peter warned of those who would scoff at Jesus and the bible. His description of their line of thinking (2 Pe 3:3-4) sounds a great deal like Evolution and its associated forms of naturalism like Big Bang theory and Uniformitarianism. Jesus first of all calls us to believe (Jn 3:16). He never asked for purely blind faith and even went so far as to condemn the foolishness of blind faith (Lk 6:39). Jesus and later his Apostles used sound reasoning to teach, preach, and persuade (Ac 18:4). They also demonstrated the power in which they believed through miracles as well as personal conviction. Peter admonished believers to be ready to explain the reason for their faith (1 Pe 3:15). Paul warned believers to be ready to show yourself approved, without shame, rightly handling the scriptures (2 Tim 2:15). Not only is it clear that Genesis means what it says, we are to believe it as we believe in our Lord Jesus and we are to be prepared to explain our faith. This is not a requirement to get a Ph.D. in creation science, but it does mean we should make an effort to be informed about what it is we claim to believe.

Darwinian Evolution absolutely requires millions of years for life to evolve and billions of years for the solar system evolve enough to support life and tens of billions of years for the universe to become as we see it today. Those in the Intelligent Design movement understand that pure materialism cannot account for the order of the universe or living things. Theistic Evolutionists accept the general premise of God as creator, but deny the essential truth of scripture by suggesting God supernaturally directed Evolution to accomplish the purpose of generating the universe and life and ordering it to the high degree we observe today. Creationists accept the straight-forward plain reading of the Genesis account and scripture generally as revealed truth from God to humanity. By taking the bible at face value Creationists are compelled to accept that the earth is just a few thousand years old and that it and the whole universe were created suddenly.

In the words of Joshua, “Choose this day whom you will serve, but as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.” (Josh 24:15)

Appendix

Jesus Confirms Genesis

Jn 2:1-11: Jesus’ first miracle was a creative act—turning water into wine.

Mt 19:4-6, Mk 10:6: Jesus quotes from Genesis in support of marriage as the sacred joining of a man and a woman into one flesh with the divine purpose of procreation.

Additional New Testament References

2 Tim 3:14-17: Be confident in your faith. To do this, be confident in what you believe. Be assured your faith is rational.

2 Tim 3:1-7: In the last days there will be those who creep in and start convincing people the creation account is fiction.

1 Pe 3:15: People will ask what you believe. Arm yourself with support for your faith. Answer questions about your faith with respect.

Jas 1:12,17: God is good. He does not change. It is a blessing to be steadfast in this belief.

Jn 12:42-43: If you don't know what you believe then you can be deceived and not only fall away yourself, but drag others down with you.

Mt 12:26: United we stand, divided we fall. There is only one truth and only one bride to Christ.

Ro 1:24-25: Paul gives us a very clear warning that we must put our faith in the Creator, not the created. The former have hope of eternal life, but the latter are allowed to do as they will to their own demise. You must know what you believe and why.

Jn 1:1-3,14: John testified to the involvement of Anointed One (Christ) as the Son of God in Creation. In fact, it declares the person of the Son was, as Son of God, with God and it was through the Son that Creation was made.

Rev 10:5-6: An angel who spoke to John declared that Jesus was in fact the one by whose hand all was created.

Ro 5:12-15: Paul considered Adam to be a real individual and personally responsible for the fall of man. Here he speaks of sin being universal, with or without a written law. He also indicates Jesus has authority to forgive sin by the free gift of grace. If God set the standard for righteousness then only God can forgive sin (through Christ).

Gen 1:27: Regardless of whether this means anything about appearance, it definitely means character. Man was created sinless and perfect of character. It was only after man sinned that death came as a result of the sin.

Heb 1:1-4: Jesus is God’s image. He did what Adam could not, and that was to live his life without disfiguring the character (image) of God. This one short passage says a great deal about Jesus, crediting him with Creation, purification for sin, and superiority over creation.

Gen 3:22-24: Following Creation, as a result of sin, man was rejected and sent away from the garden and the tree of life.

Rev 22:1-5: The final event of creation is the restoration of man to God's image in personal community with God. Our hope is life eternal without the pain and suffering from the curse of Adam.